


How to Train Your Jocks

by LostMyPenName



Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies), How to Train Your Dragon - Fandom
Genre: Drama & Romance, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Friendship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-08
Updated: 2019-03-08
Packaged: 2019-11-13 18:27:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 28,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18036572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LostMyPenName/pseuds/LostMyPenName
Summary: Hiccup has his fair share of problems for a first-year, an overbearing father pushing the family business on him, smuggling his pet Toothless into his dorm, hiding his secret minor program and a runaway ecologist mother. His life only gets more complicated when he moves into his new dorm, filled with mostly students on sports scholarships, one being a girl named Astrid. Modern AU.This is a re-post. I tried to delete one chapter and instead deleted the entire story instead...now you know why my primary site it FanFiction.Net





	1. Chapter 1

There was a grace and control to the way she ran, immediately blowing past the rest of the sprinters, she did it with ease, without any sign of discomfort. I could see her eyes locked onto the finish line, burning with determination, her blonde braid swayed with every bound and I could see her muscles contracting in her thin legs as they created dust clouds along the track.

"Hiccup."

I snapped my head around "Huh?"

"The dorm," Fishlegs pointed with his free hand. "It's this way."

I nodded, hiking my box of belongings higher onto my chest. "Right, sorry."

"You like sports or something?" he asked glancing back at me.

"No."

He let out an awkward laugh. "I meant watching, not participating."

I shrugged. "Not really."

"That's too bad, we're pretty much in the middle of all the athletic facilities here," Fishlegs stopped to point at a grey building not too far in the distance. "The dorm is over there, it's pretty much only populated by students on sports scholarships."

"How'd you end up here?"

"It was one of the cheaper buildings, and it's actually not too far from where most of our computer classes are held." I looked around at all the students ambling about, carrying their big duffel bags and sports equipment. "Plus, it's pretty close to the main subway line, it's one of the better low-cost buildings, my mom found it for me."

Toothless peaked his head out of my cardboard box and I quickly nudged him back in. "Just a little longer, bud."

"You know," Fishlegs began, throwing back another glance. "You can stay as long as you want. I don't mind sharing a room, and the extra money is always nice."

"I don't need long, just enough time to find a new place," I said shuffling the box around in my arms. "My dad wouldn't have let me move out if I hadn't told him I already had a place set up, and he probably would have found Toothless if I stayed much longer." Wrong. I didn't want my dad to find Toothless, that was true, but it was mostly an excuse, I thought I could handle school and my dad, I was wrong. I couldn't spent one more day hearing about the company, about everything he wanted me to do with it once I took over. Note the 'once' instead of 'if'.

"Oh yeah, I know," he said propping the dorm's doors open. "But you're welcome to stay, it'll be nice having someone I have things in common with around for once."

We lumbered up the stairs onto the sixth floor and squeezed through the sweaty muscle bound jocks and finally entered Fishlegs' room. It was small as expected with two beds on opposite sides of the room, each with a desk at the end. We plonked my boxes onto the bed with a sigh of relief.

"Aren't you a bit late to be moving in?" Two guys eyed me from across the hall as they leaned up against their door frame. "Classes started two weeks ago."

"I decided the dorms were better than home," I said avoiding their eyes.

The stocky guy looked over at Fishlegs. "Are you going to introduce us or what?"

"Oh, yeah," Fishlegs looked at me nervously while gesturing. "Hiccup, Snotlout, and behind him-" he pointed towards the slouching, blonde deadlock toting guy behind Snotlout. "He's Tuffnut."

"Howdy," I said flashing them an awkward grin.

Snotlout jerked his head at me. "You a computer nerd too?"

I narrowed my eyes. "Uh, yeah, I guess so..."

"Hah, I can see 'em from a mile away," he gloated clapping his hands together.

Tuffnut smirked. "I know right?" They high fived each other triumphantly.

I stepped towards them and grabbed the door. "Yeah, well, I need to pack so-"

"Hey Astrid-!" Snotlout turned away from me and wandered off. I leaned forward and glimpsed down the hall and saw 'Astrid' she was the track girl, in all her glory, glistening with sweat, just three rooms down. Her golden hair clung to her skin and her chest heaved in and out steadily, a group had amassed around her as she fiddled with her keys.

"Hiccup?"

I snapped my head around to look over at Fishlegs. "Sorry," I mumbled.

"It's weird right?" he said sitting down onto his bed. "Being around all the jocks, I thought so too, you get used to it."

"Right." I shut the door.

"Sorry about Snotlout, he's just like that, he bugged me a bit when I first moved in."

I pulled Toothless out and set him onto the ground. "Will I get used to him?"

Fishlegs laughed. "I doubt it, but he'll start ignoring you soon enough, it only took him a few days to start ignoring me."

"And..." I turned away and pretended to rummage through my things. "Who's Astrid?"

"Astrid? She's another sports scholarship student. Really popular, I hear she's one of the best athletes on campus."

I turned around. "Track right?"

"Uh, I'm not sure, I hear she does a lot."

Toothless purred and rubbed against my leg, I knelt down to pet him. I felt nervous, I tried to think about other things, school, my dad, anything, but my mind kept drifting back to Astrid. I knew the more I tried to stop thinking about her, the more I would. It was so dumb, getting the jitters over someone I didn't know, pathetic even. Self-pity, at least there's one thing I know I'm good at.

* * *

"Hey Astrid-!" I didn't have to look, I knew who it was. As soon as I heard his voice I yanked my keys out and started looking through them. Snotlout leaned against the wall nonchalantly and wiggled his eyebrows at me. "You coming to the common room tomorrow? We're throwing a little soiree, just down the hall at the end."

I shot him a quizzical look. "Do you have permission to do that?"

"Baby, I don't need permission."

"Right," I scoffed, sticking my key into the door and unlocking it. "Good luck with that then."

He shifted as I entered the room. "It's at six, I'll see you there!"

I shut the door behind me and sighed, throwing my bag onto the floor. "I know you heard us, why didn't you open the door?"

Ruffnut sat on her bed texting away. "Busy," she grinned at me. "Plus it's amusing, you going to his little party?"

"It won't be so funny when he starts hitting on you," I said grabbing some clothes from off of my bed. "And no, I'm not going."

She looked up from her phone. "You should, it won't just be him."

I pulled my tank top over my head and threw it into my hamper. "Duh, that doesn't make it much better," I put on a clean t-shirt, and started pulling down my shorts.

"Most of the building will be there," Ruff said stuffing her phone back into her pocket. "I bet there'll be a lot of hotties."

I slipped into a skirt. "I don't know, I might have to study."

"Oh come on," Ruffnut rolled her eyes. "Do you hear yourself? Try to have some fun, all you do is workout and study, school barely even started."

I opened my laptop and sat on my bed. "Maybe that's what's fun to me."

"C'mon, don't make me go by myself," she said giving me her best pouty face.

I sighed. "One hour, that's all I promise."

* * *

A little voice in my head told me to ignore the noise as I walked up the stairs, the yells and hoots and chatter that emanated from my floor. I should have turned around the instant I heard it, I should have gone to the library or the park or anywhere. When I reached the top I could see the door to the common room ajar. Don't bother. It isn't worth your time. Of course I looked, everyone always looks when they shouldn't. I peered in, the tables and chairs had been messily rearranged and various bottles and bags were scattered around the room. In the middle of the room Snotlout and another beefy looking sports student sat on opposite sides of a table, arm wrestling.

"Hey, it's the new kid," Snotlout said looking over at me. Everyone turned their head to ogle at me, this must have been taken directly from my nightmares, a group of hulky jocks all staring at me. "Join us, you can go next."

It took me a few seconds to understand, but when the realization hit, it hit hard. "Oh, no, I'm fine, I mean, I don't really arm wrestle."

"Don't be a wimp, it's not that hard," Tuffnut said pushing me into the room.

My brain was thrown into full panic mode. "No, I really don't-"

"What are you guys doing?" I thought that it couldn't get much worse than this, oh boy was I wrong. I turned and there standing behind me, was Astrid.

"You made it," Snotlout beamed, and the girl standing beside Astrid glanced around the room and nudged Astrid in the arm.

"What are you doing?" she repeated.

Snotlout shrugged, trying to act cool. "Just arm wrestling, but chickenshit over here is trying to weasel out of it," he said gesturing to me.

I knew what was going on, Snotlout was trying to look better in front of Astrid by making me look worse. Was this going to be her first impression of me? Chickenshit boy? The coward who wouldn't even arm wrestle? My brain was racing a mile a minute, would it be more humiliating to wuss out or to agree and lose? Because there was no doubt in my mind that I would lose. "I'll do it." Regret, immediate regret. That's what this whole fiasco has been, regretful actions with a side order of poor judgement.

They all cheered and hooted. "Who will be our challenger?" Snotlout roared.

I hoped for the biggest bulkiest most muscular guy they could find, someone who obviously couldn't be beaten, maybe that would dull my humiliation. Maybe Astrid would consider me even a little brave for taking him on, "Hey Astrid, do you want to take a go?" or maybe not. Every time I thought my situation couldn't get any worse the gods wanted to prove me wrong. So I sat at the table with her trying to think of any technique or strategy that would help me seem less pathetic and weak. I had never arm wrestled, I didn't even know how to position my arm properly let alone any good techniques, I decided to lock my arm in place. I knew I wouldn't win, so trying to push her arm down would be pointless, I just wanted to last as long as possible. We grabbed each other's hands and waited for the go ahead. My failure was immediate. She slammed my arm down before I even knew what was happening, bad right? You don't even know the half of it. As soon as my arm hit the table, in the midst of the cheering and laughter I felt a surge of pain in my shoulder. I winced and grabbed it with my left hand. "Ouch!"

Astrid retracted her arm. "Did I hurt you?" she asked.

"...I think you broke my arm." Everyone roared with laughter.


	2. Chapter 2

My arm wasn't broken, but honestly, it might as well have been. Everyone thought it was broken, no matter what I told them. It was a shoulder sprain, not nearly as bad as a broken arm but I had to wear a sling for three weeks, and to most people a sling just meant a broken arm. Everyone suddenly knew who I was, though I knew it was temporary, I was well known around campus as 'the kid who broke his arm wrestling with Astrid', and yes, people really called me that. I guess 'the kid who broke his arm, arm wrestling with Astrid' was too much of a mouthful, and before first period the next day, I was 'the kid dumb enough to get into a fight with Astrid'. My incredible luck really astounded me sometimes.

"Why'd you even agree to it?" Fishlegs asked as he typed away on his computer.

I rubbed the bridge of my nose. "I've been asking myself the same question all day." Chickenshit would have been better, way better, than being remembered for this. "Did you hear anything while I was in class?"

"Oh, plenty," he said. "Snotlout certainly enjoyed it, he was prancing around cracking jokes about it, I think it actually made him like Astrid more."

"And Astrid?"

"Nothing from her, she isn't really that talkative."

I could feel excess embarrassment and shame creeping over me. Of course Astrid didn't say anything, why would she care? She had only said two things to me, 'Did I hurt you?' and after my broken arm proclamation she blurted out a simple 'You serious?'. After a few people had disregarded my injury saying things like 'Oh please, you're fine' or 'You just need a workout' I decided to leave, and once I had returned, arm in sling, I got quite a few laughs to the face. Apparently their disbelief followed by my injury being real, was  _funny_ to them. Maybe it was funny to Astrid too, but it was probably more likely that she didn't give a rat's ass about it. My ringtone went off and I pulled it out of my pocket. "Great." An even deeper scowl spread across my face as I answered the phone. "Dad, hey."

_"The hospital called, you broke your arm?"_

"Shoulder sprain," I corrected.

_"What happened? How did you break it?"_

I sighed. "I sprained it."

_"How did it happen, Hiccup."_

"I was arm wrestling."

_"You can't arm wrestle."_

"Yeah, I figured that out, thanks," Fishlegs gave me a questioning expression from across the room and I returned it by mouthing 'blah blah blah'. "Dad, I have to study, and you're taking up my only usable arm."

_"Be careful alright? No more arm wrestling."_

"Ok, bye."

_"And try not to move it for a while."_

"Ok, bye," I repeated more sternly before hanging up. I leaned back onto my bed. "I should start looking for a new place to stay."

"Just because of the broken arm thing?"

"Sprained," I corrected.

Fishlegs shook his head. "It'll be fine, the whole thing will blow over before you know it."

Maybe the arm had something to do with it, I'll admit it, I was considering staying. This whole dumb situation made me realize that this fantasy I had built in my mind, of sticking around and eventually getting to know Astrid was a lost cause to begin with. I'd like to think any chance I had with her was buried that day, but if I wanted to be honest with myself, I never had a chance in the first place. I had been delusional, blinded by her pretty face and her long legs.

"Hey, there's no need to sit around here and feel shitty about it, let's go out or something, get something to eat."

I sat up and stood from my bed. "Yeah, you're probably right."

We left the dorms and began walking towards the subway, it was pretty cool out, still autumn weather. "What do you want to get?" I asked as we reached the crosswalk. "Pizza?"

"There's a really good food truck over there, everyone around here eats there," Fishlegs said gesturing with his elbow, while keeping his hands in his pockets. "They have hot dogs, burgers, lots of stuff."

I looked in the direction he had pointed to, and I saw Astrid, Ruffnut, and Tuffnut standing by the truck eating burgers as they chatted. My stomach clenched up and I instinctively shuffled a little behind Fishlegs. Then to my horror she turned around and looked over at me, my eyes darted down to my shoes. Shit. She caught me looking at her, she probably thinks I'm creepy, if I go over there now I will look even more like a creep. "Uh, I don't really feel like truck food, can we go somewhere else?" I said to Fishlegs while trying to keep myself from looking towards her.

"Sure."

* * *

Today was a long day, I woke up early for soccer practice followed immediately by the swim team tryouts, then two lectures and finally tennis practice. I wanted junk food and a long nap. I began walking towards the dorms, a textbook tucked under one arm and a duffle bag hanging off of the other. I could hear my phone buzzing from inside my bag as I climbed up the stairs, I ignored it, it was probably one of my parents calling again and I didn't have the energy to deal with them today. Tuffnut was standing half in the hall, half inside my room talking to Ruff.

"Hey, we were waiting for you," Ruffnut said grabbing her purse off of her bed. "Burgers, my treat."

I sighed throwing my stuff onto the floor. "Thank the gods."

"No, thank Ruffnut," she said smirking at me as she closed the door and locked it.

I eyed Tuffnut. "Is-"

"Snotlout isn't coming," she assured me as we made our way out of the building. "It wouldn't be much of a break if he did."

"You didn't tell him?" I asked Tuffnut.

He shrugged and gave me a crooked smile. "My loyalties lie in my stomach."

"What's the occasion then?" I asked as we reached the intersection.

Ruffnut pressed the walk button. "The occasion is that I don't want you to die from starvation, with the amount of time you spend working out you should be eating double the amount of a normal person," she said looking over me. "You're so damn thin."

"I have to be for track," I said defensively. "And you don't have to buy me food because of it."

She held up a flat palm. "It's fine, at the moment I happen to have more money than you, and given my art major that probably won't last." I laughed. "You can buy me plenty of burgers when you're a wealthy star athlete."

We walked up to the food truck and Ruffnut started ordering. "Nice job yesterday by the way," Tuffnut said.

I cocked an eyebrow. "It was just an arm wrestling match, the guy was obviously not very strong."

"No, I meant about his arm."

"What about it?"

"It's broken, you know."

I crossed my arms. "What? No it's not, you said so yourself. He's just not used to arm wrestling right?" Tuffnut snickered "Don't mess with me, you can't break someone's arm that easily."

"It's true, he came back from the hospital last night," Tuffnut said. "Ask around, everyone knows about it."

"Right," I scoffed. "It's impossible for anyone to be strong enough to break an arm like that," Ruffnut walked back to us and handed each of us a burger. "Ruff tell him I didn't break that guys arm."

"What, the kid from yesterday?"

"Yeah."

"No, man, he came back in a sling."

My mouth hung open. "You're kidding."

"I swear," Ruffnut said taking a bite out of her burger. "You should've seen Snotlout, it cracked him up, he was telling everyone on campus about it."

I lowered my face into my free hand. "Gods, he wasn't bugging the poor guy was he?"

"Naw," Tuffnut said through chomps. "I mean, he was making fun of him, but not to his face or anything."

I looked down at my burger, then back up at Ruffnut and Tuffnut. "You think I should apologize or something?"

"Hey, speak of the devil," Tuff said looking off into the distance. I turned around and saw him standing there across the street, his right arm in a sling waiting for the light to change. He noticed my gaze instantly and looked away, he turned to the boy beside him and they wandered off down the street.

"Shit, he's probably scared of me now," I took a bite from my burger. "I hate apologizing."


	3. Chapter 3

There was a knock at my door, I almost brushed it off as a dream in my sleep-induced stupor but when the second knock came I knew it was real. I stumbled out of bed and opened the door a crack, just enough for my head to fit through, my head resting on the door frame.

"Is this a bad time?" My previously drooping eyes snapped right open and met with Astrid's big blue eyes. I would have fallen over if I didn't have the door to hold onto. She winced at my response. "Don't worry, I'm not going to break your arm...again."

"Sprain..." I mumbled.

"What?"

"It's a shoulder sprain," I repeated more clearly. "You didn't break my arm."

Astrid smiled a bit. "Well that's...better I guess," she brushed her bangs away from her eyes. "I'm sorry anyway. About the whole thing, I should've been easier on you, since it was your first-time arm wrestling."

"You don't know if it was my first time," I defended, she cocked her eyebrow at me. "Fine, you can have that one."

She laughed, and it was brilliant. "Anyway, I didn't mean it, so you don't have to avoid me or anything," she turned to leave. "Oh, and don't listen to what Snotlout says, he's an idiot." I could only nod dumbly at her. "Sorry for waking you!" she called out as she walked down the hall. I shut the door and sat on my bed, pleasantly shocked.

"What was it?" Fishlegs murmured groggily.

I pulled out my laptop. "It was nothing, go back to sleep," I said opening my laptop, my computer opened to residence listings. I stared at them for a moment, before deleting the tab. Maybe I was being too hopeful, her apology probably didn't mean much, but it gave me a little much-needed optimism, even if only for a little while, I would let myself succumb to the silly dream. I didn't speak to Astrid for the next few days, I saw her, returning from practice, talking to people outside her room. I wanted to talk to her, but I couldn't bring myself to walk up and start a conversation. When she said I didn't have to avoid her, what did that mean? Did that mean she wanted me to talk to her like everyone else, or go about like the whole thing had never happened? I just didn't know, and so I just minded my own business and acted like it had never happened. It felt safer that way.

"What are you guys doing?" I looked over my shoulder where Tuffnut, and what looked like his sister inspected our room from the hall.

"Uh," my eyes shifted around. "Setting up my console, since we just got the TV set up." They both stared through me, eyeing the game console as Fishlegs fiddled with the wires. I could tell what they wanted. "Do you want to play? When it's set up, I mean."

With that said, they barged straight into the room and made themselves comfortable on my bed. "What games you got for it?" Tuffnut asked leering at the console.

I glanced over at my shelf. "A lot, I guess, I have Dragon Riders."

"Got the sequel? Dragon Defenders?" Tuffnuts sister asked.

"Yeah," I nodded. "And the third one, Dragon Masters."

They both stared at me with wide eyes. "I didn't even know it was out yet," Tuffnut blurted out. "How'd you get it?"

"I paid extra, got it in the mail this morning," I said handing them the box. They both grabbed it at the same time and started inspecting the box, raving about it all the while.

"There you are Ruff." My heart started pounding, and I turned to see Astrid standing in the doorway, hands on her hips. "We were supposed to go to the gym remember?"

"Oh, relax," Ruff said limply waving her hand in the air. "You can miss one measly workout, this kids got Dragon Masters for his console."

"Dragon what-now?"

"It's an RPG-style video game," I said, rather bravely. "You fly around on dragons and fight monsters and vikings," I tried to make it sound as enticing as possible, maybe even a little cool in hopes that I would spark her interest.

"It sounds like a colossal waste of time," Astrid huffed, glowering at Ruff. I'll admit it, that felt bad. It was dumb being affected so profoundly by one comment she made about a videogame, but nonetheless, it felt bad. "You coming or not Ruffnut?"

Ruffnut walked over to Astrid and pulled her into the room. "It'll be fun, you know what  _fun_ is right?"

"Ha-ha, you're so funny," Astrid said rolling her eyes, Ruffnut gave her a stern expression. "Fine, I'll  _try_ and that's it." Astrid plonked down beside me on the floor, almost as if it were normal, like we were just a group of casual friends. It was a good feeling, I still felt nervous but less than usual. "So how does this work?"

I handed her a controller. "Here, the game will explain the controls once everything is set up." Her fingers brushed mine as she took it from me and I did my best not to blush. Fishlegs connected the last wire and the screen lit up. "There we go, you can make your character now." She handled the controller awkwardly at first, but caught on quickly.

"The graphics are really good," she commented. They were good, Astrid was obviously trying to model her avatar after herself and it worked. It looked just like her, adorned in armour and fur with a great big blue dragon and a two-handed axe. The theme seemed to stick and soon everyone had made their characters look like themselves. It was the most fun I had had in a long time, I never really had anyone to play my games with, but today, I had more than enough. Even Astrid, who had called the game a waste of time, was having a blast, and was surprisingly good at the game despite being a novice.

"How did you do that?" she shouted, shoving me in the arm.

I chuckled. "Haven't you been reading the game tips in the upper right corner?"

"What-? No," Astrid tried swinging her axe at my character.

"You can't hit me, we're on the same team," I said grinning. "Friendly fire is off."

She shot a glare at me. "If we're on the same team why are you getting all the experience points?"

"If you make the finishing blow you get more points."

Astrid jabbed me. "Well then stop making all the finishing blows."

"Times up guys," Tuffnut said staring at his phone. "It's our turn." Astrid and I handed the controllers to Ruffnut and Tuffnut. They both got right into it, arguing and button mashing. We moved from the floor onto Fishlegs' bed. The game had been distracting, and without it Astrid's presence right beside me started to really sink in and I began getting nervous again. She was so calm, as she sat there watching Ruffnut and Tuffnut play, her composed demeanour only made me more nervous.

"Still think it's a waste of time?" Maybe that was too rude, she might take offence to that.

Astrid smiled at me, oh gods she smiled at me. "Alright, I was wrong," she brushed her bangs away from her eyes. "It's pretty damn fun, thanks for letting us play."

I shrugged. "It's no problem."

"You play a lot of games?" Astrid asked. "Like, video games?"

"Yeah," I answered reluctantly.

"Hey, it's nothing to be ashamed of," she stretched out her arms over her head. "Someone said you did computers, you a programming major?"

"Computer engineering, yeah."

"So then it's not really a waste of time for you, since you might make games one day," Astrid looked over at me. "Is that what you're going to do when you get out of here?"

I hesitated for a second, what did I want to do? "I, I don't know. Maybe," I turned to look at her, she was still facing me. "You?"

"Sports, maybe the Olympics," Astrid said. "It's what I'm best at."

"What's your major?"

"Political science, the plan is to go to law school. I can't be an athlete forever, unfortunately." On the other side of the room, underneath my bed, Toothless poked his head out and looked around. My eyes nearly popped out of their skull. Astrid just furrowed her brows and looked over at me. "Uh, is that-"

"Shh!" I held out my hand frantically waving it. "Don't say anything."

Her eyes trailed towards Fishlegs. "Does-"

"He knows," I whispered. Luckily Tuffnut and Ruffnut we're completely preoccupied with their game and didn't notice us whispering. "Just, don't tell anyone."

"There are other dorms that allow pets you know."

I knew, and I it knew well. This was supposed to be temporary, but what could I tell her? That I had put off looking for a new place so I could be around her more? I didn't know how she would react, and I didn't want to know. Astrid might find it cute, even a little endearing, but it was much more likely that she would think I was a total creep and maybe I was, but I didn't want her to know it. So I lied. "I want to stick with Fishlegs, and he really likes it here."

"Yeah, it's always nice being around friends."

"So...?"

Astrid winked at me. "I didn't see a thing." I walked over to my bed and pushed Toothless back under. Astrid looked at her phone. "Ruff, if we don't go now, we'll barely even break a sweat before we have to leave."

Ruffnut groaned. "Fine, fine," she said handing her controller off to Fishlegs and grabbing her bag to leave. "Later losers."

"Hey, thanks again Astrid." It seemed my hopes we're not as far fetched as I thought they were. Astrid smiled at me as she pulled her bag over her shoulder, she opened her mouth to speak, but stopped and narrowed her eyes at me.

"What's your name by the way?" Well, I can dream can't I?


	4. Chapter 4

Just as quickly as it had blown up, the broken arm disaster had blown over just as Fishlegs had predicted. The whole thing seemed a lot less regrettable and I started to appreciate the after effects it had brought on. Astrid and I were acquaintances, we would say hi when we passed in the hall, every once in a while I would invite her over to play games. She usually declined because of her busy schedule, but the few times she accepted made it all worthwhile. I was still in a sling but it didn't really bother me anymore, I was in a great mood. Acquaintance wasn't really a title to brag about, especially since Astrid had so many, but that title gave me courage, even if only a little.

"Hey, you," I looked up from my computer, a tall brawny guy had opened the door to my room and stuck his head inside. "I'm looking for Astrid."

"Um, I don't believe she's here," I said standing from my desk. "She left a little over an hour ago, for practice I think."

He snorted. "She's on like a million teams that doesn't really help."

"Sorry, I didn't hear anything else."

He growled in annoyance and threw a package at me. "Give her that, it's important."

I winced fumbling to catch it. "Hey, watch the arm."

"You deaf? I said give it to her."

"What, right now?"

"I said it was important," he shot back. "Tell her it's from Dagur."

I glared at him. "I don't know where she is, I can't-"

"Get to it freckle-face, I'll be back," he grunted before disappearing down the hall. The package was squishy and light, probably an article of clothing. I decided to just leave it in front of her door but as I bent over to place it on the ground Ruffnut showed up, sweaty, yanking earbuds out from under her messy tousled hair.

"What's that?"

I stood back up. "Someone wanted me to give this to Astrid, but I don't know where she is."

She pulled out her keys and unlocked the door. "She's down at the school's gym, but you can leave it with me."

I looked down at the package, I would be doing exactly what the guy wanted if I went and gave it to Astrid, but I wanted to do it anyway. An excuse to go see her had fallen into my lap and I wasn't going to pass it up. "No, I'll go give it to her, he said it was important," I replied.

Ruffnut shrugged her shoulders and went inside of her room without another word. I left the building and wandered in what I thought was the right direction, I had seen the gym before but I never had the need to find it so it took me a while longer to figure out where it was. As I walked in, stick thin with an arm in a sling, I got a lot of funny side glances and snickers from all the jocks and athletes as I walked past, watching them do curls and squats and whatever else it is you do at the gym. I looked around for Astrid, a little lost in this strange foreign environment known as the gym, but when I saw her blonde braid swaying side to side I knew I had found her. "Astrid."

She nearly did a double take when she saw me. "Hiccup?" She panted as she ran, nearly sprinting on her treadmill. "Did you need something?"

"Don't you think you're going a bit fast?"

Astrid smiled at me. "No pain no gain, right?"

"Not really a phrase I look to," I said awkwardly before holding up the package for her to see. "I was asked to give this to you, the guy said it was important."

"Who?"

"I think he said his name was Dagur."

Her expression quickly became sour at the sound of his name and she turned the treadmill off. "Don't take anything from that ass," she said as she gasped for air, resting her hands on her knees.

"Who is he?"

"He's some guy from the football team," Astrid explained through heavy breaths. "They keep harassing me to join, I just ignore them," she said as she wiped sweat away from her forehead.

"Should I give it back to him?"

"No, give it to me," she took the package and ripped the top off revealing a football jersey. She held it up over her chest and smirked. "Check it out, I'm number fifteen."

I chuckled. "Well since you have a jersey I guess it's official."

Astrid laughed and smacked me on the arm. "Yeah right," she dumped the jersey back into its packaging and tossed it into a trash bin behind her. "Did he say anything else?"

"Well he called me a freckle-face, and said he would be back."

"Be back?" she repeated sounding a little annoyed. "Be back for you or be back for me?"

I shrugged. "I don't know, we live on the same floor, probably both."

Astrid groaned. "Gods he's such a pain in the ass."

I swallowed hard and felt my stomach clench up. "How about," I rubbed the back of my neck awkwardly. "How about we go do something, maybe we can miss him."

She cocked her head while leaning on the treadmill handlebar. "Did you have anything particular in mind?"

"Well, I was thinking maybe mini golf, it's half-off today."

Astrid snickered at me as she picked up her bag. "Mini golf?"

"It's probably the only sport I can beat you at," I said with a shrug and a klutzy grin.

"Mini golf is not a sport," she said rolling her eyes and starting to walk towards the change rooms, before entering she looked back at me. "But challenge accepted."

I had never been so happy to play mini golf in my life, and the more time I spent with Astrid the more I liked her. Every little detail I learned about her only made her seem more beautiful to me. Astrid probably won the first round despite only using one arm to compensate, but after several holes, we had completely forgotten to keep track of the score, we were having too much fun to pay attention to who was winning.

"Zoology?" she asked taking her ice cream cone from me. "Is that what you're interested in?"

I licked my vanilla cone while thinking. "I guess so, I am enjoying it, even if it's just a minor," I sighed. "It's not like I don't enjoy programming, I do."

"Then what's the problem?" Astrid asked biting off some of her cone.

"I know if I stick to programming my dad will give me a job, he's so preoccupied with the idea that I'll succeed him he doesn't even notice how much it bothers me," I leaned up against a trash can. "If I take a job in the family business it'll only mislead him."

"You should talk to him."

"Trust me, I've tried," I growled. "He's a terrible listener."

Astrid brushed her bangs away from her face. "What about your mom? Maybe she could help you talk to him, or is she trying to get you to inherit the business too?"

"No, she left when I was a kid. I barely remember her."

"Oh, I'm sorry."

I shook my head and took another lick from my ice cream. "It's not like that, she's an environmentalist. She travels all around the world for her work, I get a postcard every now and then. Last I heard she was in Brazil."

"I don't think that makes it much easier," Astrid said giving me a shoulder nudge, I nudged her back and we both smiled at one another. "What do you say we stop being so gloomy and finish our game? Right now you're not Hiccup the confused first-year your Hiccup the self-proclaimed putt-putt master defending his title, which by the way, you're doing a poor job of."

"I was winning that last game and you know it," I scoffed. "And when did I say I was a putt-putt master?"

Astrid smirked and wagged a finger at me. "Any time you say you can beat me at a game you're basically claiming you're a master."

I snickered. "So, does chess count?"

She narrowed her eyes at me. "Is that another challenge I smell?"

* * *

 

"Where were you?" Ruffnut asked me as I quietly shuffled into our room.

I stuffed my keys into my gym bag and dropped it beside my bed. "Avoiding Dagur, he came by to give me a jersey, can you believe that prick?"

"Huh. So that's who that was from."

"You knew?" I asked whipping my head around to look at Ruff.

"No, Hiccup came by to drop off a package," she said eyes glued to her phone. "He didn't tell me who it was from."

I flopped on my bed and stared at the ceiling. "Well, it was from Dagur."

"So what did you do for four hours?" Ruffnut asked glancing up from her phone.

"Was it that long?" I said looking at my watch. "Shit, time flies." Ruff cocked an eyebrow at me. "I was out at the mini golf place, then the book store."

She snickered. "What, did you play five games?"

"Three, actually," I replied propping myself onto an elbow. "I was playing chess in the bookstore for a while too."

Ruffnut lowered her phone. and eyed me. "With who?"

"Hiccup."

"The nerd down the hall?"

I rolled my eyes and sighed. "Yes, the nerd down the hall."

"Wow."

I sat up and frowned at her. "Wow what?"

She shrugged. "Nothing, I just didn't know you went for that."

"Went for what?"

"Awkward guys, lanky guys, nerdy guys, pretty much any adjective that describes Hiccup," Ruffnut said. "You could do way better than that."

"We're friends," I said sternly. "And don't call him a 'that', it's rude."

Ruffnut held up her palms defensively. "Didn't mean to insult your boyfriend."

I shot her an unamused expression from across the room. "He doesn't like me like that, don't be a dick."

"He's totally crushing on you, it's obvious."

"Right ."

She threw a pillow at my head. "I'm serious, just because he doesn't throw himself at you like Snotlout does, doesn't mean it's not true." I shut my mouth and looked at her, signalling her to continue. "I've caught him staring at you like ten times and he's only been in the building for a little over two weeks. You should've seen his face when I suggested you arm wrestle with him, priceless."

"Oh come on," I said shaking my head. "He didn't even know me then."

"I saw him carrying all his stuff in with his fat nerd friend from our window, he was gawking at you while you were running track, and he would get all nervous and shifty when we passed in the hall," Ruffnut laughed a little. "Why do you think I volunteered you to arm wrestle in the first place?"

"You did that to purposely distress him?" I exclaimed glaring at Ruff. "I gave him a shoulder sprain, he's still in a sling!"

"I know, it turned out better than I thought," she said continuing to text.

* * *

 "You like her, don't you?"

I dropped my controller and snapped my neck around to look at Fishlegs. "Huh?"

"I know it's none of my business," he said pausing the game. "It's just way you talk about her, and the way she's always distracting you...I didn't want to say anything before, but you know, it's starting to sound serious."

"It's nothing," I said trying to sound nonchalant. "I mean, it hasn't even been three weeks since we met."

Fishlegs put his controller down. "That's why I'm worried, I get that you had a lot of fun tonight but we both know what your chances are," He rubbed the back of his neck. "And even if she does like you, you barely know her. I've had bad experiences with popular kids like her, they seem cool at first, but they never stick around long for guys like us."

"I get it."

"I'm not trying to be an asshole, I just don't want you to get your hopes up if you're going to be let down."

I nodded. "I completely get it, Fish, but I gotta try. I've never felt like this for anyone before."

"I can't say I know what you're feeling," Fishlegs said putting a hand on my shoulder. "But I'm here for you man."

I smiled. "Thanks."


	5. Chapter 5

It was a relief to finally have both my arms back, video games were a lot easier to play once my right arm could hold the controller properly, and writing notes, and pretty much everything else. Dawn of the Dragon Racers, the new TV show loosely based on the Dragon Riders video game had come out the weekend preceding the removal of my sling. I downloaded it on Netflix on the day it came out, but I waited for everyone else to have time to watch it together.

"No can do man, we're watching Dawn of the Dragon Racers," Tuffnut said taking a swig from his beer bottle.

Snotlout jerked his head back with a confused, almost repulsed expression. "Dragon Racers? It looks like nerd one and nerd two have been rubbing their nerd off on you," he shook his head. "Half of the girl's volleyball team is going at this movie night dude, have you even seen their...volleyballs?" he said putting emphasis on the word 'volleyballs' as he made a cupping motion with his hands.

"Subtle," I choked out, despite my better judgement.

Snotlout glowered at me before turning back to Tuffnut. "C'mon dude, don't bail on me."

"Have you seen the teaser trailer for this?" Tuff said raising his eyebrows dramatically. "I've waited long enough, the girl's volleyball team isn't going anywhere."

"Are you seriously trying to get me to watch Dawn of the Dorks?" Snotlout grunted crossing his arms. "Because-" Astrid and Ruffnut walked out of their room, carrying a bowl of popcorn and two pillows. They walked past us while casually chatting and headed straight into my room to join Fishlegs. Snotlout's head seemed to turn on an axis following Astrid, once she had entered the room he blinked back into reality. "I guess I could come," he said shrugging casually.

I rolled my eyes and walked back into my room. "Well hurry up, we're starting soon." It was cramped with the six of us all crammed into our little room. Astrid and Ruffnut had brought pillows so they could sit on the floor, and naturally, Snotlout immediately squashed in beside Astrid, leaving me, Fishlegs and Tuffnut on the bed above them. The seating arrangement wasn't exactly ideal. I sat directly behind Snotlout and from my position I could see every lecherous ogle and every failed attempt of the yawn-and-stretch Snotlout pulled on Astrid. It was more than a little distracting.

"I'll be sure to download the second episode as soon as it comes out," I said as everyone gathered up their belongings. "So, same time next week."

Tuffnut gave Snotlout a jab. "You can't tell me that wasn't awesome."

"It was okay," Snotlout said looking off to the side. "Anyway, see you guys next week," Tuffnut and Snotlout both walked back across the hall and inside their room.

Fishlegs looked at his watch. "It's only six, I think I'm going to squeeze in some time at the library, see you later Hiccup."

"Wait up," Ruffnut called out. "I've got a test coming up, I'll go with you," she looked back to Astrid. "You don't mind taking the stuff back to our room do you?"

Astrid shook her head. "No, I don't mind," There was a pause, we both stood in the doorway without moving or saying anything, but it wasn't awkward, just kind of peaceful. "I could barely concentrate with all of them stuffed into one room," she said with a laugh, kind of said as a joke, kind of not.

"Yeah, me neither." It's a strange feeling to understand what someone's thinking and know that they understand you too. We both smiled at each other and walked straight back into my room to watch the episode again.

Snotlout continued to tag along to our weekly viewings of Dawn of the Dragon Racers, it was a little weird and kind of surreal but he really seemed to enjoy it, and not just because of Astrid. He would occasionally visit with Tuffnut and play games and it was actually nice, without really knowing it I had created a little group of unlikely friends over a video game and a tv show. Snotlout was still obnoxious, no doubt about that, but by the time we had watched the fifth episode he had really settled in. I was almost glad he had joined in, almost. I had nearly forgotten about the elephant in the room, Snotlout's uncomfortably obvious infatuation with Astrid. For a few days I thought Snotlout's affections had been diverted to dragon-related entertainment, maybe so, but it was only temporarily diverted. I should have realized that there is only so long you can distract a horny, impulsive, alpha-male from his primary focus in life. Coitus.

"You're pals with Astrid right?"

For a second I wasn't sure who Snotlout was talking to, it was late, and Tuffnut and Snotlout had taken over our room to play Dragon Masters, neither one had said much to me that night as I quietly did my homework. Fishlegs shot me a worried expression from the other side of the room. "What?"

Snotlout paused the game and turned to look back at me. "I know you guys chill a lot, does she tell you, you know, girl stuff?"

I stared at him, completely baffled. "...Huh?"

"Look, I know you guys can all tell that I like Astrid," he began, acting rather uncharacteristically sincere. I could tell where this was going, and I didn't like it. "You just seem to get along with her so well, do you think you could give me advice? Maybe tell me what sorts of things she likes?"

What had happened to the world? I was not the type of guy that other guys went to for girl advice, and Snotlout was definitely not the type to ask for help. There was no way in hell I would tell him that I liked her, knowing Snotlout, he would probably tell Astrid in the most embarrassing and awful way he could conjure up and I would never live to see the end of his torment. No, I was certain I couldn't tell him. However helping him hit on Astrid wasn't exactly an ideal option either. "Gee, I don't know Snotlout. Isn't that an invasion of her privacy?"

"Don't worry, man," he said enthusiastically. "I won't tell her you said anything."

My face retained its blank stare. "That makes me feel much better Snotlout, thanks," I said, words dripping with sarcasm.

He frowned. "Hey, abandoning a friend in need is also morally unethical."

"There were so many things wrong with that sentence I don't even know where to begin," I said dragging a hand across my face.

"How about the redundancy of saying 'morally unethical'?" Fishlegs suggested, quickly turning to avoid Snotlout's inevitable glare.

"Hiccup, if there was anyone else I could go to, I would be asking them, believe me," Snotlout pleaded. "I need your help, just this once."

"Why don't you just ask Ruffnut?"

He huffed, "I can't ask her ."

I cocked my head like a frustrated parent. "Why not?"

"Because she's-," he winced. "A girl ."

"How observant."

Snotlout scowled. "You laugh now, but they're all sisters man."

"No, he's totally right dude," Tuffnut said. "Bros over hoes," Snotlout and Tuffnut both nodded and grinned to one another in agreement.

I scoffed "I thought this was about trying to get Astrid to like you."

"It is."

"Then here's a tip; don't say shit like that," I responded sarcastically.

Snotlout shuffled a little closer to me. "Okay, what else?"

"Whoa-" I held up my hands. "That-, I wasn't giving you advice," I tried to rephrase. "I'm not giving you advice about this, Snotlout. You need to do this on your own."

He winked at me mischievously. "Riiight, you're not giving me advice, I got it."

There is a lesson to be learned from today, I would be better off minding my own business and keeping my mouth shut. Oh, and jocks don't always mix well with sarcasm, which is too bad since about fifty percent of what comes out of my face is sarcasm. Hint; this is where the keeping my mouth shut lesson comes in.


	6. Chapter 6

It felt natural around Astrid, a lot of my nerves had gone away. The only thing that got me flustered was my looming unsavoury thoughts, I didn't want to just be another guy who was crushing on her, because the gods know there was no shortage of them. I certainly didn't want to be lumped into the same category as Snotlout, because I wasn't like Snotlout, not in the slightest. Astrid and I were friends, good friends, and a part of me picked apart her actions wondering if she really only saw me as a friend. Snotlout was only an additional complication that I didn't need. It didn't matter what I said to him, in his mind I was his own personal Astrid coach. It wouldn't have been such a problem if not for Astrid, every little embarrassing secret seemed so much worse with the prospect that she might hear about it. The last thing I wanted was for Astrid to believe that I was creepily helping Snotlout pick her up.

I had been invited to a big Halloween party near campus in one of the school's frat houses, the anxiety and excitement of my first party was nothing in comparison to all my other worries. There was no doubt in my mind that Snotlout was expecting me to help him woo Astrid tonight, and Astrid had invited us to go with her to ward-off other guys. Fishlegs had agreed to go on the condition that I stick to his side for moral support, and the twins had made it abundantly clear that their goal during the party was to get me shit-faced drunk. And if that wasn't enough, word around the grapevine was that Dagur was coming to the event, and he was not someone I wanted to bump into. Who knew having a social life was so much work?

Our costumes were less than impressive, the twins had both worn shirts with the word 'costume' crudely written across them, I'm not sure if they were trying to be clever or if they were just too lazy to think of something else, I would probably lean towards the latter. Fishlegs and I wore old homemade costumes of obscure comic book characters that I'm sure nobody would recognize, and Snotlout, declaring that Halloween costumes were lame decided to go as a werewolf. Since it wasn't a full moon on that particular night, that meant he was just a normal guy with a joke to tell once in a while. Astrid had the only passable costume, a little old school, but it was a classic. She was a zombie, with the fake blood, ripped clothes and everything. The six of us all crammed into Snotlout's old minivan and drove off to the party together.

"Are you okay?" Astrid asked me. I nodded, nervously drumming my fingers on my leg. She grabbed my hand to stop me. "You need to relax, let's go mingle a little."

Fishlegs jolted off of the wall we were leaning against, as we watched a group of frat boys play beer pong. "I  _do not_ think that's a good idea."

Astrid let go of my hand and put her hands on her hips. "Fishlegs, we can't stay here all night, let's go dance."

I shook my head vigorously. "I can't dance."

"Everyone can dance," she said. "You can't dance well, that's the difference."

"Wow, thanks."

"I was joking." My expression didn't waver. Astrid crossed her arms. "Well, we're not staying here, we're going to either mingle or dance, it's your choice."

"Mingle." "Dance." Fishlegs and I both turned to look at each other.

"Are you kidding?" he said. "You want to actually talk to these people? Dancing can be an individual activity, we should stay away from jocks, especially drunk jocks."

"You already have friends who are jocks, what's the big deal? Besides not everyone here is athletic, there are plenty of other people to talk to."

He continued shaking his head defiantly. "Nope, I'm not doing it."

"At least it's better than grinding up against strangers in a sweaty, overcrowded room."

"Alright, alright," Astrid said waving her hands in the air. "This isn't the fifth grade, we're not bound by the buddy-system. Fishlegs can go dance and Hiccup can go mingle, problem solved."

"I don't want to be alone in this place," Fishlegs cried out.

Astrid sighed. "Relax Fishlegs, I'll go with you."

"So I have to go alone?" I asked frantically as they started walking off.

Astrid looked over her shoulder. "Hiccup, just make some new friends and then you won't be alone, that's the whole point of mingling. I can't deal with two babies at once." Then she wandered off with Fishlegs and disappeared into the crowd. I cursed under my breath. Why me?

"Ditched by your friends, huh?" I jumped at the voice behind me, and turned to see a pretty girl with dark hair wearing a set of cat ears. "Hiccup, right?"

"How'd you know?"

She smiled at me. "I overheard your friends, I'm Heather by the way," she said as she extended out a hand.

I reluctantly shook it. "Hi."

"You don't seem like the party-goer type," Heather looked around. "I don't usually go to events like this either. Why did you come out?"

"Friends, you?"

"I'm trying to get inspiration, for a piece I'm writing. literature major."

I smiled awkwardly. "Ah, I'm a computer engineering major."

* * *

 

"He's actually better than I thought," Ruffnut commented as she watched Fishlegs attempt the robot with Tuffnut and Snotlout.

I laughed and gave her a shove in the arm. "That's only because you had exceptionally low expectations for him, that's pretty much the only dance he can do properly, just so you know."

"I think it's about time we started flirting with some guys," Ruffnut said, starting to look around the room. "If we wait any longer the volleyball team will snatch up all the hot ones...how about that guy?"

I wrinkled my nose. "Really? That guy?"

"Then how about...him," Ruffnut pointed to a tall guy with tousled brown hair and a defined jawline. He had on a loose white shirt and a pair of dirty jeans. No costume.

"He's cute, go for it."

Ruffnut snorted at me. "I meant  _you_  should go talk to him."

"I don't know, I'm pretty busy with school and practice, my workload is only going to increase."

Ruff stared at me blankly. "Wow, I wish you could hear how lame that sounded."

"Shut up," I said elbowing her.

"I'm only trying to help you out," she said elbowing me back. "Yikes, with an attitude like that I know why you've only ever dated two guys."

"Because I'm only eighteen, that's why," I replied to her in an irritated tone. "What happened to the days when having a long record of ex-boyfriends was a bad thing?"

"Astrid."

"What?"

"The hot guy is totally checking you out," I turned my head. "Don't look," Ruffnut exclaimed and I quickly turned back. "I think I've seen him somewhere before..." she mumbled to herself. "On a sports team or something..."

"What's he doing?" I asked.

"Soccer team? No, not the soccer team..."

"Ruffnut," I hissed impatiently. "What is he doing?"

She clapped her hands together dramatically. "Basketball, he's on the basketball team."

"Oh fuck this," I cursed throwing a glance over my shoulder at him, he was staring directly at me. I quickly turned back. "Oh shit, he definitely saw me look."

Ruffnut lowered her face into her hand and shook her head. "I told you not to look."

"Yes, I know," I shot back. "That ship has sailed already, what do I do now?"

"Uh...turn around?"

"What?" I crossed my arms. "I thought you said-"

"Hey," a voice called out from behind me. I turned slowly around and as I had anticipated from Ruffnut's sultry expression, the basketball guy stood tall right behind me with a cool expression on his face. "You caught me looking at you, so I figured I had nothing to lose. I get it if you think I'm creepy now."

"No," I shook my head. "I don't think you're creepy."

He sighed. "That's a relief, because I think you're really cute."

"You think I'm cute?" I said smirking at him.

He nodded. "Yeah, and you're…?"

"Astrid."

"Nice costume, Astrid," he smiled at me seductively. "I think I've heard of you, you're the sports jack of all trades girl."

"That's me."

"I'm just into basketball," he admitted holding up his hands. "I would say it's because I want to devote all my energy into basketball, but honestly, I just suck at all other sports. I probably only made it into basketball because of my height."

I laughed and slapped him on the arm. "I doubt that, you're all muscle and no fat. You don't get that from just being tall."

"Oh, Astrid, are you trying to seduce me?" He joked.

I smiled and rolled my eyes at him. "As if, boys are gross."

He laughed loudly. "Hey, do you and your friend want to see something cool? I learned how to do a backflip a few days ago, it is not an easy task, especially when you're my height," he eyed me devilishly. "I bet you that you can't do one in ten tries."

Challenges were always my weakness, and I felt the rush as I narrowed my eyes at him. "Oh you're on," I replied quickly. "Let's go onto the front lawn, there's more space there."

As we walked to the front door Ruffnut kept nudging and winking at me while trying to stifle a snicker. Then I saw something that took me a little aback. I didn't want it to be a big deal, I had only known Hiccup for a month and it didn't bother me that he had an innocent crush on me. He handled it a lot better than most guys who had crushes on me did. He was much more subtle and mature, he kept it to himself. It wouldn't be long until he moved on to someone else, I know how guys are, the pretty athletic girl seems really cool at first but sooner or later they find someone they actually have things in common with. I've seen it a dozen times, and of all the guys, Hiccup had the least in common with me. Sure we liked the dragon show and the dragon game, and we liked putt-putt and chess, but none of those were serious hobbies. Hiccup loves a lot of things that I find less than interesting, like his devoted interest in model planes or his own personal religion, the Night-Fury comics. Hiccup didn't like sports, or pretty much anything related to physical activity and he was just as disinterested in law as I was disinterested in computer engineering.

I would occasionally try to imagine what sort of girl would suit him best, and I'll grant, when I saw that pretty raven-haired girl chatting with him at first I did think she suited him. As the end of the evening drew near however, the whole ordeal had left me with a bad taste in my mouth.

* * *

 

By the time I had made it back to the dance floor Snotlout and Tuffnut had passed out on the couch and Fishlegs had turned to sleepily watching Lilo and Stitch while eating french toaster sticks. I slumped beside him on the sofa. "How was dancing?"

"Good, how was mingling?"

I thought for a second. "Good, better than I thought."

There was a quiet moment as Fishlegs slowly chewed and swallowed one of his toaster sticks. "We're never going to another party again."

"Oh, yeah, definitely not."

He chuckled a little before yawning. "That's good to hear. We should probably be getting home soon, we have classes tomorrow."

I nodded and looked back at Tuffnut and Snotlout, who were sleeping on the other couch. "How are we going to get them home? Should we wake them up?"

"I guess we should," Fishlegs stood from his seat on the couch and set his plate on the coffee table. "We need his keys, help me find them." He walked over to Snotlout and started gently shaking him. "Hey, wake up, we need your keys, we're going home." He grunted and turned over onto his side, Fish sighed and began rifling through Snotlout's pockets and fished the keys out of his jacket. "Have you been drinking?"

I shook my head. "No."

"Good," he said tossing the keys to me. "Let's see if we can get them into the car."

"Wait," I said. "Where's Astrid? We've got to find her before we leave, Ruffnut too."

Fishlegs continued shaking Snotlout. "I think I saw Astrid and Ruffnut leave with some guy about an hour ago."

"Some guy?" I bit my lower lip. "What guy? Had she been drinking?"

Fishlegs shrugged. "I don't know, she didn't look drunk to me."

I wasn't sure why I had asked if she had been drinking. I'd like to believe it was because I was concerned that whoever she had left with was taking advantage of her intoxicated state and that Astrid didn't know what she was doing. Though trying to imagine Astrid being taken advantage of was a difficult task, and a part of me thought I had asked because I hoped she was drunk and that she had left with him only on an impulse during the craziness of the party. "Maybe we should text her, just to be sure she doesn't need a ride back."

"Nah, they told me we could leave whenever."

"When did she say that?" I asked pulling my phone out.

"When we were dancing."

I turned my phone on. "I should anyway, so we know if she's okay." When my phone started up I noticed a single text in my inbox, I opened it, it was from Astrid twenty minutes ago. In the little Helvetica font on my screen it said;  _go home without us._


	7. Chapter 7

"I don't think I've ever seen anyone climb a tree that fast," Astrid hyped moving her arms around dramatically. "You guys should've seen it, this guy is seriously athletic, I'm surprised I've never heard anyone talk about him around campus."

Ruffnut nodded. "He was the definition of tall, dark, and handsome."

"He was really tall," Astrid confirmed while nodding.

I tried to look indifferent. "How tall is he anyway?"

"I think he said he was six-five."

I felt deflated. I was pretty tall myself, it was the one thing that I had over a lot of the other guys around Astrid, but my six-one meant nothing compared to his six-five. The mystery basketball player had everything going for him, and overnight he had swooped in and impressed Astrid. Did she like him like that? I couldn't do a backflip or climb trees with ease or walk around on my hands or even just play basketball. I couldn't compare, I wasn't even close.

"Hiccup, we weren't the only ones who met somebody right?" Astrid asked smiling at me. "I saw you talking to that girl, she was cute."

"Uh, sure."

"No way," Snotlout smacked me on the back. "Nice job, did you get any action?"

I rubbed my back tenderly. "No, I did not get any action, it's not like that with her, we just talked a bit."

"Don't be such a nice guy," Tuffnut said jokingly. "You should've got her number at the very least."

"She did give me her number actually," I shot back, regretting it immediately.

"No shit?" Tuffnut asked staring at me grinning. "The nerd has moves!"

Snotlout gave me another hard smack on the back. "My man!"

"Are you going to ask her out?" Astrid asked smiling enthusiastically at me. "We could give you some pointers, or clothes."

I looked down at myself. "What's wrong with my clothes?" I shook my head before she could reply. "Wait, no, it doesn't matter, because I'm not asking her out alright? Can we please just talk about something else?"

"You don't have to be embarrassed, Hiccup," Astrid said.

"I'm not-" I let out a frustrated sigh. "Look, I've got a lot of homework to do, so if you guys could just, you know-" I said gesturing towards the door. They all looked at one another before slowly filing out of the room reluctantly, leaving me and Fishlegs alone. He looked at me from across the room. "I don't want to talk about it."

"You should just tell her."

I turned around and glared at him. "Are you kidding? She practically has a Greek god for a boyfriend, she wouldn't give me the time of day, there's no way I'm going to tell her anything."

"They're not dating," Fishlegs pointed out. "But that might not last long unless you do something about it."

"Oh please," I flopped belly first onto my bed. "As if I could do anything about it."

Fishlegs shrugged. "Just learn how to do a backflip."

"You and I both know that is never going to happen in a million years," I growled into my pillow. "Am I just doomed to always get second place because I can't do a handstand? Is that really what's most important to girls?"

"No, Ruffnut said he was good-looking too," Fish said.

"Thanks."

"You know I didn't mean it that way," he walked over to my bed looked down at me. "I'm not going to act like I'm any better, but you can't sit around too scared to make a move, and then get angry when she finds someone else."

"Yeah," I muttered. "I wish I had a time machine so I could just go frackin' dancing like you wanted to in the first place."

* * *

 

I sat at the cable pull-down machine and re-tied my shoelaces. "We should leave Hiccup alone about the whole thing with that girl he was talking to, we obviously misread him."

Ruffnut put down her weights and shot me an exhausted look. "There is no way we misread anything, did you see how he reacted to us asking about her?" she wiped sweat away from her forehead. "Why would he get so emotional if he  _didn't_  like her? He's just embarrassed."

I shrugged. "I don't know, maybe because we're harassing him about it?" I replied sarcastically.

"Fine, we can leave it alone," Ruffnut grabbed her water bottle and took a swig from it. "But I still stand by that he has it bad for her, speaking of which;" she wiggled her eyebrows at me. "You going to call that guy back?"

"I don't know, he was cute and all, it's just-"

"It's just what? He's too perfect for you?"

I sighed. "You know, if you think he's so great, why don't  _you_ call him?"

"First of all, he gave you his number, not me. Secondly, I prefer bulky men, and most importantly, I'm not the one in a rut," Ruffnut said setting her bottle back onto the floor.

I frowned. "I am not in a rut."

"Uh-huh," Ruffnut cocked her head. "Tell me the truth, do you just enjoy being the unattainable girl, who gets flirted with all the time but always turns them down, or are you seriously  _that_ picky?"

"That is not what this is about, and I'm not picky," I defend shaking my head. "I'm just not into the dating thing, I'm still young, why do I have to seek out guys all the time? I just want it to be, I don't know, spontaneous."

"What, and the basketball guy wasn't spontaneous?" Ruff asked. "By the way did he ever tell us his name?"

"That's a completely different kind of spontaneous okay? It's not the same thing," I brushed my bangs away from my face. "I just want to get to know someone without the pressure of dating, you know?"

Ruffnut raised an eyebrow. "So let me get this straight...you want to not date them and then date them?"

I sighed and turned away from Ruffnut in frustration. "You're twisting my words around that's-"

"You should have gone off with him, I would have been fine on my own," she said interrupting me. "The last thing I wanted to be is the third wheel."

"You were not the third wheel."

Ruffnut scoffed. "Maybe not to you, but to him, I was just a cock-block."

"It's not like I was going to have sex with him anyway," I said scowling. "We just met, I'm not a one-night-stand person, you should know that."

"I know, I know," Ruffnut said flopping a hand around at me. "That doesn't mean you can't call him back," I glanced off to the side and crunched up my mouth. "Oh  _come on_."

"I'll think about it, it's just-Hiccup?" From through the gym's large front window, I could see Hiccup and the raven-haired girl standing across the street chatting with one another. "He's with that girl again."

Ruffnut stood and looked out the window. "Where?"

"There, across the street," I said pointing.

Ruff walked over to the window and looked out at them. "Ooh, she is pretty."

"I know, I've seen her before," I said walking over to join her at the window. "Maybe you're right, I mean it hasn't even been one day and they're already talking to each other again."

"Of course I'm right," Ruffnut proclaimed proudly. "I'm always right."

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves," I looked out at Hiccup and the girl. "I should go over there and meet her, if I'm friendly and chill about it maybe he won't feel so embarrassed."

"You think he's embarrassed about it?"

I shrugged. "That's my best guess, she's his first semi-girlfriend, they're both probably still in that awkward middle school phase."

Ruffnut snickered. "People our age seriously still go through that?"

"Don't make fun of him," I said jabbing Ruffnut in the side. "People making jokes like that are probably the reason he's so embarrassed about it to begin with."

"How do you know showing up unannounced won't embarrass him more?"

"I don't," I pulled my jacket out of my bag. "But he can't hide from his friends forever, it's better if everyone finds out now, there will be less gloating, and next time it won't seem so scary."

"What makes you so sure he won't stick with this one? Nerds nest man," Ruffnut said.

I stuffed my phone in my pocket. "Nobody sticks with their very first girlfriend, take my bag back when you leave."

"What?" Ruffnut yelled after me as I left the building. "How long are you going to be?"

* * *

 

The creaking sound was very unsettling, anytime someone even tapped on the TV the stand it would wobble around and make irritating sounds. Snotlout and Tuffnut were not as gentle with it as they should have been, but it didn't seem to bother them at all. I don't know if it was actually worse today or if my stress had heightened the wobbling and creaking. Either way, it had been driving me to insanity for nearly an hour.

"I can't believe Astrid's going for a  _basketball_ guy," Snotlout grumped. "He wasn't even  _that_ good-looking."  _Squeak_

Tuffnut rolled his eyes. "You never saw him."  _Squeak_

"I have a  _pretty good_  imagination,"  _Squeak_ Snotlout sighed. "You think they did it?"  _Squeak_

"Oh totally."  _Squeak_

I just wanted to play some games and keep my mind off of he who must not be mentioned, but the stupid TV stand had it out for me, and Snotlout and Tuffnut wouldn't stop talking about the one thing I didn't want to hear about. Sex hadn't even crossed my mind, and I wished that they hadn't planted the thought in me. I didn't want to think about Astrid doing it was someone else, but now the question seemed to echo in my mind. Did they do it?

"They told us what they did, Ruffnut was with her the whole time," Fishlegs interjected.

Tuffnut scoffed. "As if she'd tell us about it."  _Squeak_

"Maybe they had a threesome,"  _Squeak_ Snotlout laughed at the thought.  _Squeak_

"Gross dude," Tuffnut said wincing. "You're talking about my sister, I did  _not_  need that image in my head."  _Squeak_

"Do you think it was just a one-time thing?"  _Squeak_ "Or do you think they're going to  _be_  a thing?"  _Squeak_

Tuffnut shrugged.  _Squeak_ "They'll probably be a thing," he said nonchalantly.  _Squeak_ "She seemed pretty impressed by him."  _Squeak_

"That's it," I cried out, springing up from the floor. "I'm getting a new TV stand," I stormed out of the room before anyone could say a word. Shopping, shopping, think about shopping. I hated that basketball guy, I hated him even though I had never met him, I hated him because he could do a backflip, I hated him because he was taller than me, I hated him because he seemed like a nice guy, and more than anything I hated him because he was turning me into a petty, bitter, loser. I wanted so badly to believe that Astrid didn't sleep with him that night, but I was full of uncertainty and it only made me hate him more. I stomped along the sidewalk heading towards the nearest bus stop when someone tapped me on the shoulder.

"Hiccup, hey."

I turned around trying to hold back my anger. "Oh, Heather."

She smiled at me bashfully clutching a notebook to her chest. "You seem like you're in a bad mood? What's wrong? ...Parent's birthday?"

"Well I-" I furrowed my brows. "Yeah actually...my dad's is coming up on November thirteenth...that's freaky, how'd you know that?"

Heather shrugged. "Good guess? My mom's birthday always stresses me out, we don't really get along most of the time."

I sighed. "Yeah, I don't really celebrate my dad's birthday."

"That bad huh?"

I forced a laugh. "Yeah, I guess so."

"Why are you on such bad terms?" she asked. "Has it always been like this?"

I rubbed the back of my neck. "He's always been an awful listener, so yeah. I think his brain is programmed to filter out anything I say that he doesn't want to hear."

"Did he push you into programming?"

"Uh, not exactly," I looked around. "What are you doing here? The literature campus is over on the east end isn't it?"

"I was just meeting a friend," she said.

I nodded. "Right, well I should get going, I have to get a new TV stand so…" I could hear the sound of light footsteps steadily approaching me from behind, and I turned around to see Astrid jogging towards me.

"Hey Hiccup," She said taking her final steps toward us. "This must be your friend from the party, I'm Astrid, nice to meet you."

"Heather."

Astrid seemed overly enthusiastic, but I tried not to look at her. "I saw you guys from the gym over there," she said pointing with her thumb. "I thought I'd run over and say hello. So, Heather, what major are you?"

"Literature, you?"

"I'm political science," Astrid said smiling at Heather. "Do you live on campus?"

Heather smiled back. "No, I live with my parents. Are you Hiccup's-?"

"No!" Astrid answered a little too quickly and a little too forcefully. "No, we're just friends," she finished with a laugh.

I began slowly shuffling away. "Well, I really ought to be going now."

"Well, it was nice meeting you Astrid," Heather said turning to leave. "Bye, Hiccup."

I continued walking but Astrid followed after me. "I was going to invite her to grab a bite," she sighed. "You should've talked to her more, she totally likes you, you know."

The scowl across my face deepened. "I'm not really interested."

"Why not? She's so nice and pretty."

"Is that what you think is most important to me?" I asked without looking back.

Astrid put a hand on my shoulder to stop me and walked to the front of me. "Of course not, you know that," she looked into my eyes and I turned away fighting back a blush. I felt stupid, despite everything, I was still blushing like an idiot for her. "I'll tell the guys to stop bugging you about her, they don't mean any harm, that's just how they encourage each other."

"I know," I sighed. "I'm sorry for being so moody."

A look of relief washed over Astrid and she pushed her hands into her pockets. "Don't worry about it, I know better than anyone how they can get under your skin," she moved out of my way. "Where are you going?"

We continued walking. "Ikea, I need to replace the TV stand."

"Oh, the wobbly one?" she laughed at the thought. "Did it break?"

I shook my head. "I want to replace it before that happens, the squeaking was starting to drive me mental."

"Can I tag along?" Astrid asked. "I can help you pick the colour," It was incredible how profoundly Astrid could affect me in both such a negative way and a positive way. All the insecurities and anxieties I had felt moments ago, washed away as we wandered through the showrooms talking and laughing. "Hey, I want to show you something," she said grabbing an arm, as I clutched onto the box that contained my new TV stand. Astrid lead me up onto the second-floor parking lot, it was deserted with only a few cars and stray carts scattered about.

"Wow. This is exciting."

She smacked me and grabbed onto one of the flat carts for furniture. "Get on."

I narrowed my eyes at her. "...Why?" I asked cautiously.

"You can't really tell by looking, but the ground here is wavy."

"...I don't like where this is going."

Astrid pushed the cart over to me and sat me in it by pushing down on my shoulders. "It's really fun, trust me," She took the box from my hands and sat it by the door. "You might want to hold on."

I gripped onto the cart. "Maybe you should-" Without warning, Astrid began running at full speed, which was pretty damn fast, pushing the cart across the parking lot. She was right, there were waves, I could feel them as we went up and down on the asphalt. Suddenly Astrid jumped onto the cart and let out a triumphant cry as we sped forward. When we slowed she jumped off the back and stopped the cart. "Astrid, do me a favour."

"What?" she asked breathlessly.

"Give me a turn to push."


	8. Chapter 8

The floors had been buffed to near perfection, they were so shiny I could clearly see my own reflection in them. My dirty scuffed sneakers and wrinkled clothes stood out amongst the suits and dress shoes as I walked towards the front desk. The receptionist sat busily typing away at her computer. "Berk Manufacturing, how may I help you?"

"I, uh, I'm here for-"

"Oh, Hiccup!" her face lit up instantly upon seeing me. "I'll tell your father that you're here."

I shook my hands. "Oh, that's okay, I can go up myself."

"Alright then, he's in his office, I'll call an elevator for you."

"Thanks," I said as I walked off towards the elevators. It was a long ride up to the top floor of the building, and every once in a while somebody would recognize me and greet me or ask me how school was going. I finally stopped right in front of his door, it had a big shiny nameplate that said;  _Stoick Haddock, Chief Executive Officer._ I pushed the door open and walked in, I saw him sitting at his desk, still just as enormous as always, staring into his computer screen.

"Hiccup," he stood up from his desk. "Did you need something?"

I pulled out a card. "It's your birthday, remember? Uh, I got you a card."

He walked over, took the card from my hand and read from it aloud. "Today is your birthday, I got you this card," he opened it. "...And this is the inside of it." After he had read it he looked up from the card obviously puzzled by it, trying to feign enjoyment. "It's very simple."

"It's supposed to be simple, that's the joke. You know because-" I stopped knowing that explaining the joke to him wouldn't make it any funnier, and it definitely wouldn't make things less uncomfortable. "Nevermind, happy birthday."

"Thank you for the card," he cleared his throat. "How's school going?"

"Fine."

He nodded. "Right, uh, making friends?"

"Yeah." I glanced at the door. "Well, I better get, uh, back you know."

"Right, of course." We started walking towards the door. "I can-"

"No, it's okay, I can find my way out."

He opened the door for me. "Right."

"See you, then," I said as he shut the door, I started walking back down the hall, glad I had gotten all that over with. I felt stupid ever thinking he would understand the card, I should have gotten him an actual gift but there wasn't really anything he wanted. Then, a large rough hand plonked onto my shoulder.

"Well, well, are you two actually celebrating this year?"

I turned around to a friendly face, one of my dad's old friends and head of the IT department, Gobber. "Not really, I just gave him a card."

"I suppose that's better than nothing," he said with a crooked smile. "You didn't get him a joke card did you?" I sighed. "I see, well at least you know not to make that mistake again, right?" Gobber had always been there for me when my parents had not, which was quite often. I remember the days when my dad would bring me into the office because he had some unexpected business to deal with, it always took longer than he said it would, on those days Gobber would invite me into his office or show me around the building. When I got older, he would teach me about his job, that's how I got into programming. For a little amount of time it was nice, I had something I was good at and it was something that made my dad proud of me, rather than his usual disappointment. The delusion was short lived as his admiration morphed into expectations, expectations that I couldn't live up to, expectations that I did not want to live up to. "So is there anything new going on in school?"

I sat in his office feeling a bit nostalgic, moving side to side in his swivel chair. "Not much, classes are going well."

"Your father said you're rooming with a friend, that's good, you never had any real close friends in high school."

"Actually, I have a few friends," I said perking up. "They all live on the same floor as us."

Gobber turned to look at me, with an almost disbelieving expression. "Wow, that's great. Who are they?"

"Snotlout, Ruffnut, Tuffnut, Fishlegs, and, Astrid," I said counting with my fingers

It was always apparent to me that Gobber had a sixth sense when it came to my adolescent problems. "Astrid, huh?" He said grinning at me.

"She doesn't like me like that."

"You sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure," I shrunk into my seat, the mysterious basketball guy and the unknown events of Halloween night still weighed heavily on my mind. "She likes, athletic guys. Guys who can do backflips."

Gobber wheeled his chair a little closer to me. "You just need confidence, the ladies like confidence more than backflips."

"I don't know about that," I muttered, my mind wandered to Snotlout. "She knows plenty of confident guys, and she doesn't like most of them, at least not that way."

"Well, you know her better than I do," Gobber said wheeling back to his desk. "Why don't you just ask her what kind of guy she likes?"

I scoffed. "Wh-, I can't do that, it would be way too obvious." Everyone was trying to make it sound easy, like confessing to someone for the first time was nothing to be worried about. It was everything to be worried about. Astrid wasn't just a girl I had a crush on, she was my friend, and aside from Toothless, maybe even my best friend. To not be worried about losing that was impossible. "Hey Astrid, can I talk to you?"

She looked over at me as I stuck my head out of my room. "Sure," she stuffed her keys back into her pocket, walked over and entered my room. "What's up?"

I shut the door, Toothless slunk out from under my bed and started rubbing up against Astrid's leg. I didn't know a lot about Astrid, I didn't know what exactly she had done that night, but I knew I liked her and that she made me happy. So screw what Snotlout and Tuffnut had said, I didn't care what happened, none of it changed how I felt. "You know...what girls like right? In guys, I mean."

Astrid sat down on my bed. "Yeah, I guess so."

"You see, Fishlegs has a crush on a girl," I cleared my throat. "He's too embarrassed to talk about it to anyone but me, so I figured I'd ask you for him. Just...don't tell him I told you."

"Fishlegs has a crush," she confirmed eyeing me.

I nodded. "Yup, so do you have any...pointers? I mean, what do you like in guys?"

"Well..." she hummed thinking to herself.

* * *

"What did you tell him?"

"You know, the typical stuff," I said shutting my locker. "Be polite, open doors for her, dress nicely, stuff like that."

Ruffnut pulled her pants up and started doing the buttons. "You don't particularly like any of that."

"No, but Heather probably does," I dug through my bag and pulled out a hair band

"What?" Ruffnut shook her head. "I thought this was about Fishlegs?"

I started putting my hair into a braid. "He's obviously lying because he's too embarrassed to ask about it himself, he doesn't want anyone to know it's him. If I'm going to help him, I've got to do it sneakily, that's the only way he'll accept it."

"How do you know Heather likes those things?" Ruffnut asked shoving an antiperspirant under her shirt. "You barely know the girl."

I shrugged. "From what I saw, she seemed like an ordinary, boring, nice girl. Isn't that what nice girls like?"

"Don't ask me, I wouldn't know," Ruffnut snickered. "I just think you should confirm, what if you're wrong about her, and Hiccup messes up?"

I crossed my arms and frowned at her. "So what, now  _you're_ the responsible one?"

Ruffnut stuffed her gym clothes into her bag. "I just like being the devil's advocate," she gave me a side glance. "You forgot to take your gym shirt off."

"So then what do you suggest I do? I can't just ask her, it'll embarrass Hiccup," I said as I pulled my shirt over my head. "I wouldn't even know where to find her."

"What's that?"

I picked up my shirt to put on. "What's what?"

Ruffnut pointed to a bruise on my side. "That."

"It's just a bruise, I got it a little while ago during practice," I replied pulling my shirt on. "What do you think I should do?"

"Well, you know her name and you know she's a lit major," Ruffnut said hoisting her bag onto her shoulder. "You could just ask around, someone's got to know who she is, or who her friends are, you can ask them."

I picked my bag up and we started walking out of the change rooms. "That's actually a pretty good idea, do you know what building most of the literature classes take place in?"

"I think near the east end?" Ruffnut said rubbing her chin.

"Cool, thanks."

* * *

 

"You told her what?!" Fishlegs roared at me, violently spinning his chair around to face me. "Why would you tell her something like that?"

Toothless yelped at the sudden yelling and leapt off of my lap, to return to his space under my bed. "Relax, she's not going to tell anyone about it."

Fishlegs glared at me. "You should have asked me first."

"I know, I'm sorry," I said sighing. "I didn't figure you'd say yes, and I didn't have anyone else, I don't exactly have a lot of friends."

"Of course I would have said no, and not just for the obvious reason," he said shaking his head at me. "But also because it was a terrible, terrible idea, she's so obviously going to see through you."

"What do you mean?"

"It's the oldest cliche in the book, Hiccup," Fishlegs said in a matter-of-fact tone. "If anyone's talking about 'a friend's problem' it's definitely, one hundred percent, not their friend's problem. Have you ever even watched any cartoon shows?"

I felt my stomach clench up. "So what are you saying?"

"She knows, man."

"Are you sure?" I said straightening up. "I mean, she never said anything."

Fishlegs shook his head. "That's even worse, it probably means she felt too awkward to call you out, what did she tell you to do?"

"Uhm, be polite, dress nice, pull chairs out, stuff like that."

"That sounds pretty standard," Fishlegs started biting his lip. "I don't think she wanted to tell you her personal preferences, she might be weirded out by you asking."

I ran my hands through my hair and dipped my head down. "Shit, what should I do? Is it too late already?"

"No, we can do some damage control," Fishlegs said trying to reassure me. "We need to confuse her, uh, tell her that I tried out her suggestions and it didn't work. Tell her you don't need any more advice."

"What's that going to do?" I asked looking up at him.

"She knows you didn't try it out on her yet, so she'll be confused, maybe she'll think it was something else."

I stood up. "Alright, it's worth a try." I was shaking from head to toe as I walked down the hall towards Astrid's room. I looked behind me, and I could see the door to my room opened just a crack, Fishlegs was likely peeking out to watch. I found myself walking slower and slower down the hall, until the dreaded moment when I finally reached her door. I reached up and gave the door a light knock, the door swung open almost immediately.

"Hiccup," she smiled. "What's going on?" My eyes shifted around her room and caught sight of Ruffnut. She noticed the direction of my eyes and shut the door, shuffling a few steps into the stairwell. "Is something wrong?"

"It didn't go so well..." I rubbed the back of my neck. "With Fishlegs."

She gasped. "Oh, gods, I'm sorry, is there anything I can...?"

"No, it's alright," I said shaking my hands. "I just thought you'd want to know, he won't be needing any advice."

Astrid grabbed both my shoulders and gave me a determined stare. "Don't worry Hiccup, I'm going to fix this." Then she ran back into her room, and within seconds ran back out and hurried down the stairs.

I looked down the hall, where Fishlegs' head was now completely visible. "What the hell just happened?"


	9. Chapter 9

My bed made a fwoomp sound as I collapsed onto it. "Ugh." Ruff continued staring at her computer screen without saying a word. "Uuuuuugh!" I repeated more dramatically.

Ruffnut sighed and looked over her laptop at me. "What?"

"I've been asking around for over a week now," I sat up. "Nobody in the literature department knows about a girl named Heather, so either she's lying about something or she's really  _that_ boring."

She snickered. "I'd go with the latter."

"Well how am I supposed to find her then?" I groaned pushing my face into my pillow. "She's a frakin' ghost!"

"Doesn't Hiccup have her number?" Ruffnut asked. "Just ask him for it."

I scowled at her. "Sneakily remember? I need to do this sneakily."

"Gods, why don't you just let him find someone on his own?"

"You know how superficial girls our age can be," I said. "You guys did it to Hiccup too, just because he's skinny and a little dorky. Hiccup is a really great guy and he deserves to have someone. I just want him to be happy."

Ruffnut made a puking motion. "Ugh, why don't  _you_ just date him, it would be faster." I opened my mouth to respond but I nothing came out. Ruff slowly looked up at me from behind her screen. "Holy shit, do you like him?"

"No!" I replied rather defensively.

Ruffnut look at me with skeptical eyes. "You two spend an awful lot of time together."

"I also spend a lot of time with you," I shot back. "We're close friends, alright?"

There was an aggressive knock on the door, Ruff and I both looked at each other. I stood up, walked over to the door and opened it, Dagur stood there looking just as smug as ever. As soon as I saw it was him I went to slam the door shut but he stopped the door with his foot and pried it open. "Did you get the jersey?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," I spat back trying to provoke him. "Now let go of my door."

Dagur stubbornly kept his firm grip on the door. "The football team is being generous here, my dad won't be so agreeable in the future," he said as he reached out to touch me.

"We both know this has nothing to do with your dad, and everything to do with you," I said swatting his hand away. "I'm not interested, so kindly  _fuck off_."

"That jersey wasn't cheap you know, you need to pay for it," he smirked at me. "We could make an exception if you join however."

My eyes rolled so far back into my head, they must have been completely white. "In your dreams."

"You're not so far off with that one," he sneered, grabbing one of my wrists.

I wrenched it out of his grasp and and reeled away from him. "You're disgusting."

"It's very simple, pay for the jersey, or join the team."

"I never gave it to her!" We both turned, and saw Hiccup standing just outside his door. "You can't charge her for it, she never received it."

"Hiccup-"

"Didn't I tell you it was important?" Dagur barked angrily. "What the hell did you do with it?"

Hiccup cringed a little. "I...threw it out."

Dagur's eyes burned and he stomped over to Hiccup and grabbed him by the collar. "You don't want to get on my bad side, you little shit."

"Let go of him, Dagur!" I yelled out running up to them. "This has nothing to do with him."

He tightened his grip on Hiccup's collar and glared at me. "What? You're protecting this loser?"

"Don't call him that," I warned.

Dagur scoffed. "I tell it like it is. Why can't I call a loser a loser?"

"You want to say that one more time?" I growled lowly clenching my fists.

He smirked smugly at me. "He's a los-" Before the word could fully exit his mouth my fist made contact with his face and he tumbled to the ground. Dagur looked up at me, shocked, a hand clutching his reddened cheek. "You can't punch me!"

"You want a bet?" I asked cracking my knuckles.

Dagur scrambled to his feet and narrowed his eyes menacingly. "You-, I'll tell the dean you attacked me."

"Fine, tell him," I shot back narrowing my eyes back. "But I'll tell him you assaulted Hiccup, and that you were threatening and harassing me," I rested an arm on Hiccup's shoulder. "I have a witness, what do you have?"

"Actually you have two witnesses," Ruffnut said stepping outside of our room.

Fishlegs peeked out of Hiccup's room. "Make that three."

The door across the hall opened and Tuffnut and Snotlout both stepped out. "Yeah, we were here too, so make that four, I mean, five," Tuffnut said grinning. Dagur grunted angrily and stormed off, roughly pushing past me and Hiccup.

Everyone snickered at him and returned to their rooms, I looked over at Hiccup. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," I nodded at him and started walking back to my room. "Sorry, I didn't really help much."

I turned to smile at Hiccup. "You were more help than you think."

He smiled back. "Thanks for standing up for me."

"Yeah, same here," I brushed my bangs away from my eyes. "That was really brave of you."

"I'll guess I'll see you on Dawn of the Dragon Racers night."

A thought popped into my head. "Oh hey, do you think you could invite Heather?"

"Heather?"

"Yeah, maybe she'll like it too," I said. "I was hoping to get to know her a little better."

He shrugged. "Sure, I'll give her a call."

* * *

 I cracked open a can of cat food and dumped half of it into Toothless' food dish, as I pressed my phone against my ear with my shoulder. The ring tone finally stopped and a female voice answered the phone.

_"Hello?"_

"Hey, Heather? This is Hiccup."

_"Oh hey, Hiccup, what's up?"_

"I was wondering if you've ever watched the show Dawn of the Dragon Racers?" I asked, there was a long pause. "No?"

_"...No, can't say I have."_

"No? Well that's- Astrid wanted you to come to watch an episode with us but if you haven't-" I began.

_"I don't mind coming over, at your dormitory?"_

That surprised me a little. "Oh, well, we're kind of in the middle of the series right now, so it might be kind of confusing to just watch an episode without having seen the others," I said.

_"That's alright."_

I paused, then shrugged my shoulders. "Okay, sure. We're supposed to do it on Friday, when is good for you?"

_"I can do Friday," s_ he said.

"Great, that's perfect, I'll see you later then. Bye." I hung up the phone and put it down on my desk before taking Toothless' both and setting it down on the floor.

"Is Heather going to come regularly now?" Fishlegs asked.

I set the can and my phone on my desk. "I doubt it, she doesn't seem like the type."

"Why did Astrid want to invite her anyway?"

I shrugged. "Who knows." Toothless scarfed down his food and Fishlegs eyed me suspiciously in silence. "What is it?"

"I'm just surprised...you're not panicking about what happened earlier," he said cautiously.

"Why would I be?"

Fishlegs went quiet for a second, trying to think of the best way to say what he wanted to say. "It's just, most guys would be upset being saved by the girl he likes, is all, not that you should be upset. I'm just surprised you aren't."

"She punched a guy in the face for calling me a loser," I said chuckling. "I don't know about you, but that's a pretty good sign if you ask me."

Fishlegs nodded. "Yeah, you're right." When he turned around to face his desk a large pile of papers and books tumbled off of his desk and onto the ground. "Shoot," he mumbled bending over to pick everything up.

I stepped over and began helping him when I noticed a folded up map under a pile of Snoggletog flyers. "Are you going somewhere?" I asked Fishlegs handing the map to him as he re-stacked all the papers back onto his desk.

"My mom wants to visit her parents this year so we're driving out to where they live for Snoggletog," he explained. "We don't visit a lot so I printed out a map."

"A little early to be preparing for Snoggletog isn't it?"

Fishlegs gathered up all the flyers and dumped them onto his desk. "I like getting everything done early, besides we're leaving as soon as winter break starts, and all my gifts need to be wrapped, packed and ready to go before then. And I have a big extended family."

"You're leaving that early?" I asked, a little taken aback.

He nodded. "Sure, it takes about a day's drive just to get there, so I may as well spend as much time with them as possible."

"Are you going to be there the whole winter break?"

"Of course, Snoggletog is all about family right?" he looked up at me. "Why?"

I shook my head and returned to my desk. "Just wondering." I couldn't tell him that I had thought he was going to spent winter break in the dorms with us. Fishlegs was too excited to visit his family. Snoggletog was about family, he was right, and it was a little depressing that I didn't have any intention of spending it with what little family I had. This year it wouldn't be so lonely, I had friends to spend it with, and even if Fish was going away for the holidays I had grown surprisingly attached to everyone, the twins, even Snotlout.

* * *

 

The guys all immediately took a liking to Heather, I don't know what it is about shy girls that makes guys gravitate towards them, but it was a little jarring how shamelessly they all hit on her. They all seemed to cater to her every whim with gusto, even Fishlegs was acting overly polite and accommodating around her. Heather on the other hand seemed only interested in Hiccup and she stayed glued to his side. Whatever disaster had occurred that made Hiccup think it was over, had obviously blown over, because they were getting along better than ever.

"So, Heather, I tried to find someone in the literature department who knew you and I couldn't find anyone."

She smiled at me. "Well none of my classmates really talk to me much."

"Wha-, that's crazy," Snotlout said winking. "A girl like you should be the center of attention."

For some reason the gratification I thought I would get from helping the two of them get along never came, I wanted to like Heather, but the more time I spent around her the more fake she seemed and the more suspicious I got. She got along great with Hiccup and I was happy for him, but I couldn't ignore my gut, and my gut did not like Heather, not one bit.

"So you guys are all here on sports scholarships?"

"Well my scholarship isn't a sports scholarship, but pretty much," Fishlegs confirmed.

Heather smiled widely. "Wow, are you guys on full scholarships?"

"Nah, only Astrid's on full," Ruffnut said. "She's lucky, she even gets money for room and board."

Heather turned to Hiccup. "What about you Hiccup?"

"Nope, no scholarship here," he said scratching his head awkwardly. "I'm the dummy who had to pay."

"Did your dad pay for you?"

"Yeah."

"Oh, that's right," Heather suddenly raised her voice. "How was your dad's birthday? Did you visit him?"

Hiccup sighed. "Yeah, I tried, it didn't turn out so well. It was really weird and awkward."

"It was your dad's birthday?" Fishlegs asked.

"Yeah, it was on the thirteenth, right Hiccup?" Heather said smiling at Hiccup.

It was a weird uncomfortable feeling, Heather, who was almost a stranger to Hiccup not that long ago, suddenly seemed so much closer to him. She knew when his dad's birthday was when no one else had known. It was surreal the way she asked how it had been, as if they were old friends or she was his girlfriend. The way he sighed and spoke as if he was hoping for her reassurance about an old issue, an issue she knew all too well. I didn't know what they were talking about and I felt so impossibly far away from him in that moment, how did Heather get so close without me noticing? Maybe I was being melodramatic, but I felt replaced, and it wasn't a good feeling.


	10. Chapter 10

"Who is it?"

"It's me."

Astrid opened the door for me. "Sorry, just making sure it's not Dagur again."

"Don't worry about it," I said grinning. "I had some homework, and since everyone's out I came to join you," I gestured to my laptop which was snugly tucked under my arm. "Ruffnut told me you were getting a head start on exams."

Astrid moved out of the way so I could enter. "Ruff said that?"

"Well, not exactly," I shuffled past her and took a seat on her bed. "She said you bailed on her so you could be the most over-prepared student in human history, I had to interpret what she said from there."

Astrid laughed and shut the door. "I'm glad there's someone who understands her," she sat down in front of her laptop, which was on her desk. "What homework do you have? Programming or-"

"Zoology," I responded. "I can usually finish my computer stuff really fast, it just comes naturally me. Zoology takes me more time and patience."

"I think it's admirable," Astrid said smiling at me. "You could just stick with what you're good at, but you're willing to put the work into learning something new."

"Thanks."

I opened up my laptop and started working. The room was quiet, Astrid sat at her desk reading from her laptop silently. I sat on her bed, my back against the headboard, hands hovering over my keyboard, waiting to have something to type. Astrid's gentle breathing and her occasional sighs were such a comforting sound it would make me lose my train of thought. I watched as she fiddled with the end of her braid, twisting it and twirling it around her finger.

"Hey, does definitely have an-" Astrid began without turning to look at me.

"No A."

"Right, thanks."

There was something about being around Astrid, even if we weren't talking or looking at one another, her presence was soothing to me. Just being around her made me feel calm and contented.

* * *

I couldn't concentrate all day, ever since Heather had joined our Dawn of the Dragon Racers night I felt irked. Not just because she took over the whole thing, or because I kept wondering if she was going to join in again, but because I was the one who invited her in the first place. I didn't like how I felt around her, and I really didn't like how I felt about her and Hiccup. Worst of all, I couldn't think of anything in particular that I didn't like about her, I just didn't.

As I sat there, with Hiccup a few feet away from me on my bed, my mind couldn't help but drift off to thoughts about what Ruffnut had said. "Gods, why don't you just date him, it would be faster," I hadn't thought much of it at the time, but after Heather visited I had to wonder if she was right. "Holy shit, do you like him?" Did I like Hiccup? I originally had adamantly denied it, and it wasn't to hide anything, it was genuine, or at least I thought it was. But now, I wasn't so sure.

I looked at Hiccup out of the corner of my eye. "You two spend an awful lot of time together." It was true, I spent most of my free time with Hiccup, and I always had such a good time with him, but that didn't necessarily mean that I liked him. At least not like that.

There was probably no use in worrying about it anyway, Hiccup liked Heather. There wasn't much I could do about that. I focused on my screen and continued working. "Hey, does definitely have an-" I asked without looking at him.

"No A."

"Right, thanks," I fumbled with the side of my laptop, brushing my fingers against the bumps and ridges. I decided to start studying a different class, maybe switching topics would help me focus. "I think I left my USB in that drawer, can you check for me?" I said pointing towards my bedside table.

"Sure," he said moving his laptop off of his lap and leaning over towards the table. He put his left hand down on the table for support but before even opening the drawer he retracted and grabbed his hand. "Ow, shit,"

"What's wrong?"

"I think I cut myself."

I pushed away from my desk and walked over to Hiccup. "Oh, crap, it's my fault, I'm sorry," I looked at his hand. "I broke a glass yesterday, I should have cleaned up better," I looked up at him. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," he said flashing me a crooked smile.

I looked back down at his bleeding hand and noticed a small piece of glass stuck in his palm. "There's a shard, we need to get it out," I lowered my face into my hand. "Gods, all I do is injure you."

Hiccup laughed. "It's okay, really."

I grabbed a pair of tweezers off of Ruffnut's desk and peered at the shard of glass from above, slowly I moved the tweezers towards his hand. Hiccup watched as well and I could feel the heat from his forehead less than an inch away from my own. I could also feel a few strands of his hair brushing against my temples, it only made me more nervous.

* * *

Astrid held my hand steady and surprisingly gently, "It's not that deep." The tweezers dipped down and before I knew it, she had already gotten the bloody piece of glass out. "There you go," Astrid dropped the shard into the garbage and went to her bag and started rummaging through it. "Let me get you a bandage for that."

"You're not going away for the winter break are you?"

Astrid pulled a band-aid out of her bag and smiled at me. "No, not me, my family isn't really the celebration type you know?" she said as she opened the bandage and placed it on my hand. "Though if they were, I probably wouldn't go anyway."

I chuckled. "I know what you mean."

"So, your dad's birthday passed recently?" Astrid asked gathering up the bandage packaging. "I'm surprised Heather knew, you guys must be pretty close."

I looked down at my hand. "Not really, it just came up one day, she said she had a similar problem with her mom," Astrid walked over and sat down beside me on her bed. "I ended up visiting him, it was really awkward, I probably shouldn't have bothered..."

"I think that every time I visit my family," Astrid said sighing. "I keep going back though."

"Don't we all?" I looked over at her. "They're our parents, we're always going to want them to be proud of us, whether that's good for us or not,"

Astrid shrugged. "At the moment I'm not really concerned about that," She looked over at me. "If your dad wants you to take over so badly, it's probably because he believes in you, I bet he's more proud of you than you think,"

I smiled. "Thanks."

Astrid loosened her braid and started redoing it. "You should go home for Snoggletog Hiccup, I think your father would want you there."

"What about you?"

"My parents were never into Snoggletog, it's not a big deal," she continued her braid and tied it up with a hair band. "I'm used to it by now." I watched as her braid slipped from her shoulder onto her back, and I think she noticed that I was looking at her braid because she leaned towards me and started a small braid just behind my ear. It was a very nice, feeling her fingers working in my hair.

"I haven't done anything for Snoggletog with my dad in a long time," I said trying to keep my head straight. "You guys are the first friends I've made that are my age, I want to spend it with you this year, my dad will be around, maybe if things get better I can celebrate with him next year."

"Yeah, maybe next year," Astrid mumbled releasing the little braid she had made in my hair.

My phone started buzzing in my pocket and I pulled it out to check who it was. "Speak of Loki. I'll be just a second," I said quietly leaving her room and stepping out into the hall. "Hello?"

"Hiccup."

"Oh hey dad," I moved into the stairwell. "What is it?"

"So, you know you're welcome to company Snoggletog party."

"That's alright, it's not really my scene."

"Right, well, are you going anywhere this year?"

"I think I'm going to stay at the dorms and spend Snoggletog with my friends this year."

"Oh, alright, just checking then," he paused. "Well, I won't take any more of your time."

"Okay, bye."

* * *

 

A part of me wanted Hiccup to stick around for Snoggletog, but I didn't want to take away a chance for him to spend it with his family. There wasn't a holiday that went by where I didn't wish my uncle was still able to celebrate with me, and the last thing I wanted was for Hiccup to regret all the Snoggletogs he didn't spend with his father. I had gotten used to spending the holidays alone, another year wouldn't kill me.

"Oh hey, dad." I could hear him talking outside my room. He would probably spend it with his dad, I could tell he still cared about him, even if he was frustrated with him at times. I still wasn't sure about my feelings, but it would be best if I ignored them, Heather and Hiccup would be alright, and so would I. I moved back to my desk and continued working.


	11. Chapter 11

Students swarmed in the main square as everyone bustled to prepare for the winter fair coming up. It was supposed to be a little celebration for the end of the semester right before the winter break. In theory, it was a great idea, but with the all stress and craziness of exams the last thing anyone needed was the added pressure of organizing a fair. The work had been divided up amongst the departments so most of my time was spent with Fishlegs, and I barely spoke to Astrid or the others.

Fishlegs was a very serious studier, he didn't like any distractions and he took it upon himself to read everything at least seven times before moving on. I had become so accustomed to the noisiness of having the gang over that the silence in our room with only the faint sound of clicking keys, a sound I used to be quite fond of, was eerie and unsettling now. "I think I'm going to get something to eat," I announced moving toothless off of my lap, as I expected, Fishlegs didn't reply. It had already gotten quite cold out and the ground was covered in a thick layer of fresh snow, not yet turned gray. As I shuffled towards the cafeteria, I saw Astrid walking through the park, a scarf wrapped tightly around her neck, nose and cheeks turning red from the cold, and a textbook tucked under each arm. "Astrid!" I called after her.

She smiled as I jogged over to her. "Hiccup."

"Long time no see."

Astrid sighed, and I could see her breath. "Yeah, well the library is my new home these days. Shouldn't be much longer now," she blew a strand of hair out of her face, and I reached over and brushed it away for her. "How's studying going?"

"That depends," I said. "I think I'm doing well as far as exams go, can't say the same for my sanity. I think I'm going stir-crazy."

She laughed. "Don't worry, there's only a couple more days, how many more exams do you have left?"

"Just two."

"Keep truckin' then, I should probably be-"

"Wait," I said tugging on her sleeve. "Don't go yet, we've barely spoken all week."

Astrid shook her head and smiled. "It's only a week, Hiccup."

"Can't you spare a little break?" I pleaded. I need to see her, just being around her already made me feel better, like maybe I could do this without completely losing my mind.

I could see the resolve on her face fade away and she sighed with a smile like a parent giving in to childish demands. "Alright, I guess I could use a break."

"What do you want to do?"

Astrid smirked at me and set her books down on a bench. "I have an idea," she suddenly whipped around and a snowball crashed into me, causing me to stumble backwards.

"Hey!" I grabbed a handful of snow from the ground but Astrid had already hidden herself behind the bench. "Really mature." Astrid flung another snowball at me and hit me in the shoulder, I quickly retreated behind a tree. "So it's going to be like that is it?"

I could hear her laugh. "It's the first snow of the winter, I couldn't help myself!" I went to peek around the tree at her but I had to retract immediately to avoid being hit by another snowball. "You can do better than that, Hiccup."

"Don't judge, I'm a beginner," I retorted, scrambling to the ground to make a snowball. As I fumbled with the snow around the bottom of the tree Astrid sprung up and ran over catching me by surprise. She chucked a snowball at my gut and continued running. I chased after her throwing a snowball at her as she ran, I missed by a longshot. Astrid jumped behind a tree, and she tried to fake me out by dodging around the trunk but I managed to nail her in the head with a handful of snow before tackling her to the ground. "Gotcha!" I grinned, breathing heavily. It was then that I noticed how close our faces were and I stumbled off of her. "Sorry, I got a little carried away."

Astrid laughed awkwardly and flicked a little snow at me. "It's no big deal."

"What are you guys doing?" We turned to see Heather standing over us, an amused look across her face. "You're all covered in snow."

"Just letting off a little steam," Astrid said brushing snow off of herself as she stood up. She reached out a hand to help me up and I took it. "I should probably get going then," she murmured before slogging through the snow back to where she left her textbooks.

Heather turned back to me and smiled. "Happy exams."

I flashed a small grin. "Thanks."

"You doing anything for Snoggletog?"

I brushed the snow out of my hair and rubbed at my runny nose. "Not really."

"You and your dad don't seem like you really celebrate a lot," she said stuffing her hands into her pockets. "No birthdays, no Snoggletog."

I shrugged. "He likes throwing parties for his employees, it's just that we don't talk much, and since it's just the two of us that unfortunately means no Snoggletog."

"That sucks."

"Nah, he can have it with his employees, and I can have it with my friends. It's probably better this way

* * *

 

Exams was the worst time of the year, it was nothing but long nights without sleep and way, way too much caffeine. I had to maintain my high grades in order to hold onto the one thing I could not afford to lose, my scholarship. I spent most of my time in the library to steer clear of any distractions and to have an excuse to avoid talking to anyone who dared bother me. I gathered up my books for a much-needed visit to the gym, and as I exited the library the bitter winter air hit me and it was refreshing after being cooped up for so long. I walked briskly and took a shortcut through the park to waste as little time as possible.

"Astrid!"

I almost ignored the voice in an attempt to keep my study schedule on track, but I recognized it as a certain someone and I couldn't help myself. "Hiccup." I hadn't seen him in what felt like such a long time, seeing his face as he approached me gave me comfort and I smiled.

"Long time no see."

I sighed breathlessly. "Yeah, well the library is my new home these days. Shouldn't be much longer now," I tried to blow a hair away from my face, and to my surprise Hiccup reached over and moved it with his hand. My eyes instinctively trailed off to the side, and I felt a little embarrassed by the gesture and a little embarrassed at the ratty coils my hair had become from the lack of a much-needed shower. "How's studying going?" I said trying to brush my embarrassment away.

"That depends," he said. "I think I'm doing well as far as exams go, can't say the same for my sanity. I think I'm going stir-crazy."

I laughed, something I hadn't done in a while. "Don't worry there's only a couple more days, how many more exams do you have left?"

"Just two."

The way he said 'just two' made me a little uneasy, I had two exams left as well but I would never describe them as 'just two'. I felt a little of the urgency that had gone away at the sound of Hiccup's voice and I could feel the stress creeping up on me again. "Keep truckin' then, I probably should be-"

"Wait," he said tugging on my sleeve. "Don't go yet, we've barely spoken all week."

"It's only a week, Hiccup," I said trying to convince myself just as much as I was trying to convince him to brush it off.

Hiccup didn't let go of my sleeve. "Can't you spare a little break?"

Little by little the part of me that was determined to say no was overpowered and I sighed shaking my head at him. "Alright, I guess I could use a break."

"What do you want to do?" he asked, and a mischievous thought crept into my mind. The fresh snow had been tempting me all day and I figured if I was going to cheat a little I may as well indulge.

I set my books down on a nearby bench. "I have an idea," I quickly bunched up some snow from off of the bench forming it into a snowball, then I spun around and hit him right in the gob, and as he stumbled I dove behind the bench and began making another snowball.

"Hey!" he bent down to grab some snow but noticed I had already hidden myself. "Really mature." I snickered and hit him with another, and he ran to hide behind a tree. "It's going to be like that is it?"

This time I let out a loud laugh. "It's the first snow of the winter, I couldn't help myself!" I could see his head peek out from behind the tree and I threw a snowball just barely missing him. "You can do better than that, Hiccup."

"Don't judge, I'm a beginner," he called out. I took my opportunity to run over and hit Hiccup with another snowball, before running off to find another hiding spot. Hiccup chased after me and I tried to hide behind a tree but he was on my tail, as I ducked around the trunk to get away he managed to get me right in the face with a cold handful of snow, before attacking me onto the ground. "Gotcha!" Hiccup's face was so close to mine I could feel his warm breath, and I was glad it was cold out because my cheeks were already bright pink. He realized immediately how awkward our position was and quickly got off of me. "Sorry, I got a little carried away."

"It's no big deal," I said laughing to try and act normal.

"What are you guys doing?" We turned to see Heather standing over us, an amused look across her face. "You're all covered in snow."

"Just letting off a little steam," I said brushing snow off of myself while standing up, Heather's presence immediately made me uncomfortable. I reached out a hand and hoisted Hiccup up. "I should probably get going then," I said, walking off before either one could protest. I gathered my books up and continued towards the gym, but my face still felt heated and there was an unpleasant feeling in my stomach. I glanced back and saw Heather and Hiccup casually chatting, and I clenched up my jaw. There was no mistaking it, the feeling I had around Heather might be suspicious, but more than anything, it was jealousy. As I stood there watching them talk to one another it became so clear to me what was going on, I couldn't deny it, I liked Hiccup, and not just as a friend. I regretted that I had tried to set them up, and I regretted that I had not realized my feelings sooner, Hiccup had moved on and I had lost my chance. There was nothing left to do, so I turned and continued towards the gym.

* * *

 

"Well, it was nice chatting, but I should probably get going," I said rubbing the back of my neck.

Heather nodded. "Right, well, good luck with exams and your dad." I nodded back and she trudged off towards the library.

A fist suddenly came into contact with my shoulder. "Putting the moves on her, way to go Hiccup."

I turned to face Snotlout as I held my now tender shoulder. "You know that shoulder was sprained not too long ago," I scolded him. "And I'm not putting the moves on anyone, she's barely even a friend."

"Riiiiight, you going to spend your Snoggletog with that 'friend'?"

I shook my head. "No, I'd rather spend it with you guys this year."

Snotlout snorted with a grin. "Well not with me, my dad has spared no expense, he bought a whole new set of hunting rifles and a new tent. We're going on our traditional Snoggletog hunting trip."

"For how long?"

"The whole two weeks, baby!" Snotlout cried out proudly. "I'm going to shoot my first bear if it kills me," he thought for a second. "Okay, not if it  _kills_ me, but you get the idea."

I furrowed my eyebrows, the Snoggletog I had envisioned was getting less and less populated. I guess I had underestimated the relationships everyone else had with their parents, I was a little envious. "You're leaving for the whole winter break?"

"No worries man," Snotlout said nudging me. "You'll still have you-know-who to keep you company."

I frowned. "I'm serious, there's nothing going on with her. Didn't Astrid tell you to get off my case about it?"

"Well, yeah, but you know she doesn't mean it."

I narrowed my eyes at Snotlout. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"I mean, she's trying to hook you guys up and everything," he said. "Oh, but don't tell Tuff I told you that."

I rolled my eyes. "Right."

"No for real, she told Ruff and Ruff told Tuff," Snotlout pulled his coat collar up a bit higher. "We all totally know you secretly liked her, you don't have to hide it anymore."

"What?"


	12. Chapter 12

I clutched onto my hot chocolate without drinking it to keep my hands warm as I stood waiting out by the concession stands. The six of us were meeting for the winter fair, and I would be lying if I said I didn't feel uneasy. It felt hopeless, I could deal with Astrid not reciprocating my feelings, but the thought that she was trying to set me up with another girl was too much for me. I had told her, I had told all of them that I didn't like Heather that way but it seemed that it had gone in one ear and out the other. I hadn't seen Astrid since our snowball fight, and now that I was privy to her secret intentions I wasn't sure how to face her. I wasn't even sure if I should confront her about it or not.

"You're early," Ruffnut said walking up to me with Tuffnut.

I turned to greet them. "Hey, how did you do on exams?"

Tuffnut shrugged. "Not too bad, not too good, same as usual."

"By that he means passable, but below average," Ruffnut said smirking at her brother.

I scratched the back of my head. "You guys, aren't doing anything with your family for the break are you?"

"Nah, we hate shit like that," Tuff said, and I let out a sigh of relief. "We're going on a road trip with our cousins so we can avoid all that mushy family crap. We're leaving first thing, they won't even see it coming."

My hopes sank. "For the whole break?"

"Duh," Ruffnut snorted, "we've got all year to sit around this shit hole, we should get out while we can, am I right?"

I smiled weakly. "Right." My hopes of finally having a Snoggletog celebration had shrivelled up and died, as usual, everyone had something better to do, someone better to be with.

"There they are!" Tuffnut called out waving.

I turned and watched as Snotlout, Fishlegs and Astrid walked towards us from the opposite side of the square. My eyes immediately went to Astrid as the three of them pushed through the crowd.

She smiled at me once they had reached us. "Hey."

"Hey," I replied. "What do you guys want to do first? Food?"

"Nah, let's play some carnival games," Snotlout suggested. "I'm a master at carnival games, maybe I'll win you something," he said leaning towards Astrid.

"Thanks, but no thanks," Astrid said rolling her eyes, "those games are a scam anyway."

Ruffnut gave her a shove. "Don't be a party pooper, they can be fun once in a while."

We all started shambling towards the area with the carnival games. "What kinds of games do you usually play?" Fishlegs asked Snotlout.

"I play the one where you have to knock over the bottles a lot."

Astrid scoffed. "Well now we know why you win so often, they make the bottles so heavy only an athlete would be able to knock them over."

Snotlout grinned at Astrid. "Are you complimenting my strength?"

She laughed and shook her head. "No."

Ruffnut and Tuffnut ran off to throw hoops and Fishlegs went to play darts, leaving Snotlout, Astrid, and myself at the bottle game. I scanned the prizes on display, which strangely seemed to have more of a summer than a winter theme. There were a variety of giant lollipops, some blow-up soccer and basketball themed beach balls, a large stuffed monkey and some smaller stuffed parrots in different colours.

"You going to play?" I asked Astrid.

She shook her head. "No, you go ahead though."

"Which prize do you like the best, Astrid?" Snotlout asked. "I'll get you anything you want."

Astrid held her palms up. "I really don't want anything."

Snotlout leaned over to me discreetly. "What do you think, man? She's sending me weird signals, does she want something or not? She wants a lollipop right?"

"She said she doesn't want anything," I replied. "That means she doesn't want anything."

"Oh come on, it can't be that simple. Chicks play mind games you know."

I sighed. "Well, you're right about one thing."

Snotlout ended up winning two lollipops, a soccer ball and the big monkey after spending far too much on one carnival game, and I had surprisingly managed to win a stuffed parrot.

"What do guys want to do now?"

Astrid glanced off to the right and saw the ice rink a little ways off. "Let's go skating," she suggested. "My class set it up, so I can probably hook you guys up with free skate rentals. You in?"

"Hey, free anything is good with me," Tuffnut said grinning at her.

I shook my head dramatically. "No, no, I can't skate."

Snotlout laughed. "Dude, everyone can skate."

"Relax, you can learn, it's not as hard as you think it is," Astrid said slapping me on the arm. I frowned. "You don't have to be a figure skater, just the basics, I'll teach you myself." I fought back a smile.

Tuffnut started walking forward. "Okay, okay, are we going or are we going?"

* * *

 

The ice rink was packed with people and we all had to sit on the sidewalk to put on our skates. Mine were too damn loose and I tried lacing them up as tight as possible, yanking the laces with all my strength. Hiccup struggled to jam his foot into one of his skates, it was obvious he wasn't used to any type of sports equipment. I leaned over to help him put his skate on but he jerked away from me. "I can do it."

"You need to lace them all the way down before trying to put them on," I pointed out, "they're not sneakers."

He did as I told him and continued stuffing his food in awkwardly. "They're too tight."

"They have to be, you don't want them to fall off."

"They wouldn't fall off so easily if they weren't this heavy," he said sighing. "Do you think I need a helmet?"

I snickered. "Not unless you're in grade school." He huffed. "Just hold onto me, you'll be fine."

Hiccup started stuffing his other foot into his skate. "I'm going to fall, I can feel it. I'm not very good at keeping my balance, there is no way I can learn-"

"Hiccup," I put a hand on his shoulder, "I'll stay with you, you'll be fine."

He nodded and I helped him stand up on his skates, it took him a minute to figure out how to walk with the skates on but he managed alright. I stepped onto the ice and Hiccup reluctantly followed, he slipped on the first step and gripped onto me tightly. "Gods, and I thought walking on the ground was difficult."

"You're not supposed to be walking on the ice, you're supposed to be skating."

Hiccup laughed nervously and clung to me, a little too close, I felt my face heat up and I looked away from him. I knew I had feelings for him, and even if he didn't feel the same way, it would probably be best if I told him. I couldn't hide it forever. We started moving towards the far end of the ice rink and my heart started pounding as I tried thinking of way to tell him, I didn't want to make it awkward. "Hiccup, listen, there's something that I've been meaning to-" then from over Hiccup's shoulder I saw Heather, drifting across the ice with ease, and I suddenly felt a little discouraged, maybe I shouldn't, I didn't want to complicate things. Hiccup liked Heather, and she liked him back, if I confessed now it would only make him distressed. Hiccup was such a good guy, he would probably feel bad about it and it could ruin what he and Heather already had. "Hey, Heather's over there, we should go talk to her."

He looked back at Heather. "Astrid-" I began waving at her, gesturing for her to come over to us. "Don't call her over."

"What? Why?"

"I know what you're doing okay?"

Heather skated over to us. "What's up?"

I furrowed my brows and looked at him. "What do you mean?"

"Stop trying to hook me and Heather up," Hiccup said pushing away from me, wobbling a little to keep his balance.

"You knew?"

Heather's eyes snapped back and forth between the two of us. "She was trying to hook us up?"

"She thinks we have crushes on each other," Hiccup sighed.

Heather laughed. "I don't have a crush on Hiccup."

"You don't?"

"Neither do- wait, you don't?" Hiccup asked, his head snapping around to look at Heather.

"You thought I had a crush on you too?"

Hiccup rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. "Well, everyone kept saying you did…and you always wanted to spend time with me."

"I was just writing an article about your dad," Heather defended.

"You were-" his mouth opened in shock. "You were writing an article about my dad? Why?"

"I was writing a hard-hitting expose about how CEO's have poor relationships with their kids, because of their workload," Heather admitted.

My jaw nearly hit the ice. "Your dad is a CEO? What's going on?"

"How did you know my dad was a CEO?"

Heather crossed her arms. "Journalist never reveal their sources."

I narrowed my eyes at her. "What do you mean journalist?"

"Oh yeah...the thing is, I'm actually a journalism major."

"You were lying to me?" Hiccup cried out at her. "So you could write an article?"

I stomped my skate against the ice below my feet. "I knew it!"

Hiccup turned to me. "You knew?"

"No, not exactly that. But I knew something was up," I said holding up my hands, "nobody in the lit department knew who she was, and I could never find her around there."

Heather glared at me. "Were you spying on me?"

"You're one to talk," I growled back at her, "and no, I wasn't spying on you, I was going to ask your friends what you liked in guys, since Hiccup was asking-"

She turned back to Hiccup. "You were asking about what I liked in guys?"

Hiccup groaned and threw his head back. "No, I never-" then his eyes popped open and he looked over at me. "Wait a second, you thought I was asking about her that time? I wasn't asking because of her."

"You weren't?"

"Of course not."

"Then who were you asking for?" I asked.

Hiccup hesitated. "Fishlegs."

I rolled my eyes and looked away from him. "Oh please."

"What, do you believe what Tuffnut and Snotlout say over what I say?" He growled at me.

"That's not-"

Hiccup quickly interrupted me. "You should've come to me first, instead of believing what everyone else says about me and going behind my back."

"Who told you?"

"Does it matter?"

"Yes, it matters."

"Snotlout told me okay?" Hiccup yelled throwing his hands down. "Now can you stop with all the sneaking around?"

I winced and felt a twinge of guilt, I shouldn't have been so angry. "I'm sorry, I was just trying to help."

"There's nothing wrong with being single, you know," he spat.

Before I knew it the anger I had tried to bury suddenly came back to life with a vengeance. "I know that, Hiccup."

"Yeah, alright," he replied sarcastically.

"What's that supposed to mean? You think I believe there's something wrong being single?" I clenched up my jaw and my fists, trying to keep calm. "I'm single."

Hiccup huffed and looked away from me. "What about that basketball guy, you seemed to go along with him pretty fast."

"Who?" my eyes burned in the side of his head. "Are you talking about that guy from Halloween? Seriously?"

"You left with him, remember?"

"So I leave a party with a guy and that automatically means I slept with him?"

"I didn't say that."

"You didn't have to," I said through my teeth, "and for your information, no, I did not sleep with a guy I had just met. I haven't even spoken to him since then, so yes, I am single."

"Everyone was just so convinced-"

"You know, I find it pretty fucking funny how much of a hypocrite you are," I said beginning to skate away.

"Astrid-"

I whipped my head around and gave him the dirtiest look I could muster up. "No, this conversation is over, I'm going back."

* * *

"What about that basketball guy, you seemed to go along with him pretty fast," I said looking away, that was a low blow and I knew it, I couldn't even look her in the face as I said it. I was too blinded by anger to realize what I had done.

"Who? Are you talking about that guy from Halloween? Seriously?"

"You left with him, remember?" I said staring at my feet.

"So I leave a party with a guy and that automatically means I slept with him?"

I felt regret, I could see how much I had offended her and I knew I had made a terrible mistake. "I didn't say that."

"You didn't have to," Astrid said gritting her teeth and glaring at me, "and for your information, no, I did not sleep with a guy I had just met. I haven't even spoken to him since then, so yes, I am single."

I should have known it from the start, and either way, it shouldn't have mattered. "Everyone was just so convinced-"

"You know, I find it pretty fucking funny how much of a hypocrite you are," she said beginning to skate away.

I couldn't move without falling so I tried to reach out to her. "Astrid-"

Astrid whipped her head around and gave me a horrible expression, she looked furious, but more than anything, she looked hurt. "No, this conversation is over, I'm going back." She turned around and skated away.

Heather and I both stood there silently for a minute, she looked dumbfounded and confused by how quickly our conversation had escalated. "I'm sorry, I didn't think-" she stopped, likely from of lack of words.

"It's not your fault," I said quietly. "Can you help me get back?"


	13. Chapter 13

She hates me."

"She doesn't hate you."

We carried down Fishlegs' suitcases down to the parking lot. "She definitely hates me, hell, I would hate me if I was in her position."

Fishlegs stopped are stared sternly at me. "She doesn't hate you."

"You don't even know what happened."

"So you said some things you shouldn't have," he said opening the door and heading outside. "Maybe she thinks she hates you now, but she doesn't hate you."

We walked over to his mother's car. "She was right, I was being a hypocrite, and a jerk, and an idiot."

"She called you an idiot?"

"No, I added that, but she should have."

Fishlegs and I began loading his things into the back of the car's trunk. "What exactly did you say to her?"

"I fucked up okay? I fucked up bad."

"Just go apologize."

I sighed heavily. "Every time I try to talk to her she runs off, and if you recall, she's at the top of the track team, so that's pretty damn fast."

"You should probably let her cool off then, she'll get over it eventually."

"You think?" I said perking up.

Fishlegs shrugged. "I'm just speculating, your guess is as good as mine."

I shut the trunk. "Well if I was to apologize...what should I say? Just saying 'I'm sorry' isn't good enough right? It's got to be better than that."

"It's Snoggletog isn't it? Give her something."

I cringed at the thought. "Astrid's not like other girls, I have a really bad feeling that if I showed up and tried to give her flowers or jewelry now she'd probably be even angrier at me."

Fish sighed. "I don't know what to tell you then, let her cool off. When she's less angry you can talk to her." He glanced over his shoulder to where his mom was waiting in the driver's seat. "I've got to go now, but I'll text you okay? And when I get there we can Skype."

I nodded and watched as he hopped into the passenger's seat of the car and rode off down the street disappearing into the thick city traffic. My Snoggletog was over, the only person who hadn't left to go on vacation was avoiding me like the plague, I guess it was going to be another uneventful holiday. Seven days to Snoggletog, and the eerie silence of studying students had been replaced by the even eerier silence of an empty dorm. The campus had turned into a ghost town, I sure had I chosen the perfect time to pick a fight with the only other person staying behind.

* * *

It was immature of me to avoid Hiccup so much, but I knew the second he apologized with his big stupid green eyes, and that dumb crooked smile, I would forgive him immediately. I didn't want to forgive him, I wanted to be angry at him, even if it was irrational. I stubbornly clung to my anger like a child and kept replaying the fight in my mind. I told myself that he deserved it, I had never felt so insulted by one person's words in my entire life, nothing had ever hurt quite this badly. It wasn't just what he had said, it was that  _he_ had said it.

"Just get over it."

I growled over the phone. "That's easy for you to say, he didn't call you... _easy_."

Ruffnut sighed. "He didn't call you easy."

"He may as well have, he was insinuating it."

"Accidentally."

I huffed stubbornly. "Yeah, well, accidentally feels just as shitty as on purpose does."

I could hear Tuffnut and their cousins being noisy in the background. "He hasn't apologized yet? Knowing him, I thought he would have days ago."

"I haven't let him."

"Well let him for Thor's sake," Ruff said dramatically. "Everyone does stupid shit, and you both did things you shouldn't have but being stubborn about it isn't helping anyone. If your goal here is to make him feel bad about what he said I'm sure he already does, he's a nerd with low self-esteem he's probably beaten himself up about it plenty by now." I kept silent. "Look it's my turn to drive, I'll call you tomorrow, think about it okay?"

"Okay, bye," I muttered, hanging up the phone.

I glanced out the window at the falling rain, it more like slush though, the weather had warmed up the past few days and slush had been falling almost constantly. Somehow it still felt just as cold as before. The days leading up to Snoggletog seemed to slog by, with no one around and nothing to do it was easy to wallow in my anger, but no matter how much I told myself to blame him, I knew I was also at fault. I should have spoken to him first, he wasn't wrong about that. I let out an exasperated sigh and got up from my bed, everything was closed during Snoggletog so some snacks from the vending machine in the common room would have to do for breakfast. I swung my door open and low and behold Hiccup was there leaning up against the wall beside my door. He turned to look at me and I quickly slammed the door shut in his face.

"Astrid," Hiccup called out from the hall. He was tried, I could hear it in his voice.

My hand stayed tightly gripped around the doorknob, I couldn't do this forever, I didn't want to make Hiccup feel bad, not anymore, not on Snoggletog. I slowly opened the door again.

"I'm really sorry, I didn't mean it, I should've-"

"No," I stopped him, "you don't have to- well, I'm sorry too. I shouldn't have gone behind your back like that, no matter my intentions. So, you don't have to apologize."

"I do though, I was upset when I found out, but that doesn't excuse what I did, what I said." Hiccup's eyes lowered to his feet. "I regret it, I regretted it the instant I said it, you were right, I was being a hypocrite."

"I'm sorry I avoided you for so long," I said. "I was upset too, I didn't want you to think I was like...that."

Hiccup's head snapped up. "I don't! I never meant any of it, I know you're not that person. It doesn't even matter anyway, it doesn't change that I-" He stopped mid-sentence and cleared his throat. Then he moved his hands up towards me and I noticed a bundle crudely wrapped up in newspaper and tied up with a blue ribbon. Hiccup handed the package to me. "Happy Snoggletog. I, uh, didn't have much time to prepare for this…"

I smiled at him and took it, gingerly removing the wrapping. Inside was the stuffed parrot from the carnival, it was turquoise and yellow with a cartoony unrealistic design. It was knitted, likely made by students and it had a little brown tag tied onto its tail. "Stormfly," I read off of the tag.

"It kind of lame, but I didn't have anything-"

"I love her," I said hugging Stormfly to my chest. "She's perfect."

Hiccup grinned sheepishly and rubbed the back of his neck. "I'm glad."

"I didn't get you anything."

"Don't worry about it, I just wanted us to be okay. We are okay, right?"

"Yeah, we're okay," I said smiling and nodding at him. "So, you want to grab some chips from the vending machine and have ourselves a little Snoggletog breakfast."

Hiccup sighed with relief. "That sounds nice, yeah." I shut my door behind me and we started walking down the hall towards the common room. "You not the Snoggletog type?"

"I used to be, don't really celebrate anymore," I replied. "You?"

"I think I am, never got much of a chance to experience it," he said as we entered the common room. "I went to company parties and stuff, never really got the family experience though, at least not that I can remember anymore."

I popped a couple of coins into the machine and pressed a few buttons. "Right, CEO's son. Hard-hitting expose." I watched as my Cheetos slowly inched closer to the edge. "You know when you said 'family business' I was imagining more of a mom-and-pop shop." I grabbed my chips and turned to look at Hiccup. "Why didn't you tell me? No, never mind, it's none of my business."

"It's alright," he said, "it's not that I was hiding it from you or anything, I just didn't want you guys to treat me differently because of it." Hiccup sighed. "Being open about it hasn't exactly helped me in the past, so I try not to go around advertising it."

"I don't care who your dad is, Hiccup, and I don't think the guys do either." I shuffled out of the way so he could access the vending machine. "But I'll keep it to myself if you want me to."

Hiccup stuffed a crumpled bill into the machine. "It's alright, you can tell them, I trust you."

"Well it's not me you have to worry about," I said opening my bag and munching on a Cheeto. "...what's your dad's company do anyway?" I looked up at him. "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to."

He grabbed his chocolate bar from the machine and undid its wrapper. "No it's alright, the company is Berk Manufacturing."

"Holy shit," I cursed, whipping my head around to look at him. "So you're seriously rich, no wonder you're not on a scholarship."

Hiccup chuckled. "Correction, my dad is seriously rich." He took a bite from his bar. "I'm not really interested in inheriting all that."

"Aren't you an only child? You don't really have a choice do you?"

He sighed. "That's what I'm afraid of."

I propped myself up onto one of the tables. "Some things you can't run away from Hiccup, but choosing to take responsibility of your inheritance doesn't mean giving up everything that's important to you."

"The thing is, I'm not entirely sure what I want to do." He propped himself up and sat beside me. "Maybe I'd be fine inheriting the business, but I don't want to lock myself into a future I might not want. It's terrifying to think that the decisions I make in the first few years of my life will define the rest of it. What if I make the wrong choice and screw everything up?"

"Nobody said you couldn't change your mind," I said patting him on the back. "Right now it might seem like you're the only one who isn't sure where your life is going, but I'll tell you a secret," he turned to look at me. "Nobody really knows."

"Don't you know? You're always so sure of yourself."

"Nobody," I repeated.

Hiccup chuckled to himself. "I guess self-pity really is what I'm best at."

"Well, we're all good at something," I joked, and Hiccup shot me an amused grin. "Hey, I was wondering..."

Hiccup took another bite from his chocolate bar. "Yeah?"

"Your dad is paying for your room and board right?" He nodded. "So why did you decide to live in this dump? You could have a nice spiffy apartment where pets were allowed, no shared bathroom, your own kitchen...you must be a damn good friend to give all that up just so you can stay with Fishlegs."

Hiccup shifted his eyes away from me. "This was actually meant to be more of a temporary living situation."

"What happened then?"

He hesitated and began fidgeting and squirming. "I, uh, I stayed because of you."

My heart beat immediately quickened and I felt my stomach churn nervously. I was barely able to choke out any words."What?"

"...I was going to find a new place, but I wanted to stay where you were, I liked you." Hiccup turned away from me. "I still like you."


	14. Chapter 14

"So what happened then?"

I remembered the reason I had stayed and I stiffened at the thought. I couldn't tell her I stayed for her, but no matter how I wracked my brain I couldn't think of a sensible excuse. Maybe I should tell her, my mind wandered to Fishlegs' advice, he had told me to confess more than once, maybe he was right. After everything that had happened, I believed that if she didn't feel the same way, our friendship was strong enough to make it through this. "I, uh, I stayed because of you."

She didn't speak for a moment, but to me, that moment felt like an eternity of silence. My stomach began to churn and I started to doubt my decision. Was it a mistake to tell her? Did I freak her out?

"...What?"

My mouth felt incredibly dry as I spoke. "I was going to find a new place, but I wanted to stay where you were, I liked you. I still like you." I looked away, I felt too uneasy to look at her face.

"Turn around Hiccup," she said quietly.

"I can't look at you, it's too embarrassing."

"Then cover your eyes."

I did as Astrid said and covered my eyes before turning to face her. I wanted to say something snappy but I was too nervous to think of anything. Just as I was about to peek out I felt something press against my mouth and I froze. After a few seconds, it moved away and I removed my hands from my face. Astrid was staring straight at me. "Gods, I hope that's what I think it was."

She smiled. "I feel the same, Hiccup."

I almost didn't believe my ears, and all I could do was stare dumbly at her. "Huh?"

"I like you too."

"Like... _like_ like?"

Astrid snickered at me. "Yeah, _like_ like."

And then suddenly, Snoggletog wasn't so bad anymore. "Since when?"

She shrugged. "A little while I guess, I figured it out during exams."

"Exams?" I repeated.

"Yeah, why?"

I laughed awkwardly. "I think I've liked you since I moved in." My eyes trailed away from her. "You probably think I'm total weirdo now."

"Of course," she said nudging me. "That's what I like about you."

There was an awkward silence and I felt both extremely happy and extremely uncomfortable at the same time. I could feel Astrid looking at me. "What now?" I said breaking the silence.

She let out a loud laugh. "It's funny, after everything that happened and all my stressing out, I didn't even think we would ever really get here." Astrid sighed. "Now that we're here I don't even know what to do."

"Yeah, same."

"Oh gods," Astrid dropped her face into hands. "What is Ruff going to say? I kept denying it to her, she'll never let me live it down."

I looked over at her. "Actually, could we not tell the guys just yet?"

"Are you embarrassed about it?"

"No, no," I said shaking my hands. "It's only, uhm, Snotlout might think I'm helping him...hook up with you, I never agreed to it though, I swear."

Astrid gave me a reassuring pat on the shoulder. "I believe you, don't worry, I know how he can be sometimes. He's not exactly a great listener."

"Thanks."

"I can still tell Ruff though, right? She won't tell him."

"No, she'll tell Tuffnut and he'll tell Snotlout." I cocked my head at her. "It happened before remember? The whole Heather thing?"

She nodded. "Right, good point, no telling Ruffnut."

* * *

The big ugly minivan Ruffnut and Tuffnut had borrowed to take their road trip came rolling up into the dorm's parking lot first, the stinky old engine making terrible sounds as they did. I could recognize it from a mile away, because of the unmistakably putrid yellow colour it sported. It was just the two of them, they had probably dropped their cousins off before arriving back on campus. I walked down the stairs and across the parking lot to greet them as they climbed out of the van, arguing as usual.

"You need to stop hogging them, it's my turn!"

"No way, you're going to put them in your smelly room and stink them up."

I waved one of my hands around to try and get their attention. "Hey, how was the road trip?"

Ruff looked over and grinned at me. "Astrid, you wanna see what our cousins got us for Snoggletog? It's great."

"Sure, what it is?" Ruffnut stretched her arms out and displayed a taxidermied two-headed snake. "That's...great. It's not going in our room is it?"

"Sure is."

"No, it's going in my room," Tuffnut protested.

From the corner of my eye I saw Hiccup coming out of the dorm to join us just in time to watch Fishlegs and his mom drive up. I turned to Ruffnut and Tuffnut who were still arguing over their snake. "Will you two stop fighting? Fishlegs is back."

Tuffnut snatched the snake from his sister and rushed over to the car. "Hey, Fish, check out my snake. Pretty sweet right?"

"Our snake!" Ruffnut called out before turning to look at me. "So?"

"What?"

She glared at me. "Don't what me, you didn't pick up my calls after Snoggletog, did something happen? Did you follow my advice and finally make-up with him? Or should I remove the word 'Hiccup' from my vocabulary?"

"Yeah we made up." Ruffnut continued to stare at me. "What is it?"

She huffed, clearly irritated. "What, no juicy details, just, 'we made up' the end?"

I shrugged. "There wasn't anything juicy okay? He gave a parrot and apologized, so we made up, it's not a big deal. I was overreacting anyway."

"He gave you a parrot?"

"A stuffed parrot."

"Really? A stuffed parrot? He couldn't do better than that?" Ruffnut scoffed.

I crossed my arms. "What's wrong with that? I like parrots."

"Since when?"

"Since...forever!" I said as we walked over to the guys. "So what did you get for Snoggletog, Fishlegs?

He rummaged through his things. "A lot of really ugly sweaters, some fruit cake, a few mugs and this thing." He pulled out a small rock-shaped gadget, on the tiny screen there was a small pixelated pug. "Meet my digital pet, Meatlug. My mom got me this since I'm allergic to most animals."

"He's cute," I said grinning.

"He's a she, actually," he corrected. "I heard females were more affectionate." Fishlegs glanced from me to Astrid and then back. "You guys aren't still...?"

"No, we're good Fish," Hiccup said shooting me a smile.

Fishlegs sighed and smiled. "Phew, I'm glad."

"Guys, check it out!" Tuffnut cried out. "There is no freaking way!" We all turned to look at Tuffnut, and we saw him staring and pointing towards the road where Snotlout was driving in a new shiny red chopper. My jaw nearly hit the floor, Snotlout noticed our staring and he began hooting and hollering at us as he screeched into the parking lot toward us. "Dude, you did not!" Tuff said running up to the bike.

Snotlout hopped off of the bike. "You better believe it baby." He rubbed the side of the motorcycle which had the word 'Hookfang' painted on the side. "My dad gave him to me for Snoggletog plus my birthday, combo gift man, the best kind."

"It was your birthday?"

"Yeah, five days before Snoggletog," Snotlout wiggled his eyebrows at me. "Sorry you missed it babe, you wanna take a ride?" he said gesturing towards his motorbike.

I rolled my eyes. "Thanks but no thanks."

"Hey, can we have our reunion not in a parking lot?" Ruffnut called out at us from her van. We each gave a nod and began to help load everyone's things back into their rooms.

* * *

Everyone had returned from vacation and the dorms were suddenly back to life again. After two weeks of quiet, the bustling atmosphere that returned felt a little strange, and also a little refreshing, but I still missed the time when is was only me and Astrid. Now that everyone was back and I had to keep what was going on with us on the down low, I didn't get to talk to her nearly as much as I did during winter break. I knew I had to talk to Snotlout or we would be in hiding forever, but every time I built up the courage to break it to him I would chicken out at the last moment.

"What's up with you lately man?"

"Huh?"

"You're acting all fidgety, well...more fidgety," Snotlout said to me without looking up from his phone.

My eyes trailed away from him. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Oh come on," he said putting his phone down. "Don't give me that shit."

I began to squirm. "Alright, it's, uh, about Astrid. I don't think I can help you with her."

"Hey, I know you're not the best with the ladies, but you know Astrid well," Snotlout said giving me a slap on the back. "Don't sell yourself short."

"That's not really-"

"You're not still fighting are you?"

"No," I said sighing, "that's not the problem."

He turned towards me and cocked an eyebrow at me. "So what's the problem then?"

"She's just, not really into to you like that, you know?"

Snotlout frowned. "How do you know that? Did you talk to her about me?"

"Not...exactly..."

"What's not to be into?" he said furrowing his eyebrows, "I'm a total studmuffin!"

I rubbed the back of my neck awkwardly. "Well, uh, let's just say, you're not exactly her type."

"You know what her type is?" he asked perking up. "You've got to tell me what it is."

I winced. "Not really, it's mostly speculation."

"Don't hold out on me now man, you've got to tell me. We're bros aren't we?"

"Well..."

"I won't tell her it was you who said something."

"It's not really that..."

"Come on, one little favour, man to man."

To say I was a coward would be an incredible understatement, I regretted not telling him the truth, but the next day I regretted a lot more than that. What I had told Snotlout in an attempt to discourage him had had the opposite effect, unfortunately. The very next morning he strolled out of his room in platform shoes, clothes two sizes too small while holding a stack of comic books, wearing his typical Snotlout smile.

"What the hell happened to him?" Fishlegs muttered under his breath. "He looks like an idiot, and more than the usual amount."

"Oh no."

Fish turned to look at me. "What?"

"I think this is my fault."

Snotlout strolled down the hall and knocked on Astrid's door and as soon as she saw him her head immediately snapped to glare at me from down the hall. "Hey, Astrid, you want to read a comic book or something?" He winked at her as he gestured towards the comics he was holding. Ruffnut shoved next to Astrid by the door and when she saw what Snotlout was wearing she burst into hysterical laughter.

"Sorry Snotlout, I've got plans today."

"All day?"

She narrowed her eyes at me. "Yeah, well, someone has a lot of explaining to do."


End file.
